Two uniformed police officers in what appear to be full gear get out of the patrol car, but are then only wearing their underpants – it was an internet hit with widespread media coverage that the German Police Union (DPolG) in Bavaria created with this video on April 1st. It wasn’t an April Fool’s joke, but a wake-up call about supply shortages for uniforms. “Currently, 21 uniform items, such as trousers, jackets and hats, can only be delivered with waiting times of several months,” complained DPolG state chief Jürgen Köhnlein and called for “finally quick relief” from the Interior Ministry. Some colleagues went about their work in the last pair of pants they could wear – and if they were to break, that would be the point of the underwear.
Now the cause is reaching the state parliament. “Will the Bavarian police soon have to go on patrol in their underpants?” This is the quickly worded title of an SPD request – the lack of uniforms must be remedied. Christiane Feichtmeier, member of the Interior Committee and former Police Commissioner. D., submitted the question to the plenary session for Tuesday’s meeting.
After the much-noticed video, she wants to know from the state government what options for accelerating procurement and awarding or what alternative procurement options have been examined in the past three years – and with what results. “It shouldn’t be the case that our police don’t have proper work clothes. We need a quick solution, and the Interior Minister should examine options here without blinders,” Feichtmeier told the SZ. She is thinking, for example, about possible orders from her Austrian colleagues, who apparently have their own production.
After the DPolG video, the Interior Ministry described delivery bottlenecks for uniform parts as “a major nuisance for us.” State Police President Michael Schwald apparently consulted with police departments and personnel representatives several times about the bottlenecks after taking office in 2022. Bavaria’s police obtain uniforms from the Lower Saxony police logistics center. According to the ministry, problems have existed since the outbreak of the Corona crisis, and now also in view of the war in Ukraine; mainly “due to the permanently disrupted supply chains”. Backlogs on individual items have recently been “reduced” and we are “working on the fastest possible solution”. The operational capability of the Bavarian police is still “fully guaranteed”; if there is a shortage of special types of trousers such as the “multi-purpose summer trousers”, other models of service trousers can be used. The ministry also wants to report on this to the Interior Committee this Wednesday.
In the medium term, the police in Bavaria will once again take over the procurement of uniforms themselves: their own logistics center is being built in Hof, the final expansion of which should be completed by 2030. It should take care of everything the police need, from office chairs to helicopters. Procurement of uniforms cannot begin until 2027 at the earliest. Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann (CSU) inaugurated the center last year, saying it was “a great investment” for supplying the police and sustainably strengthening the Hof region. The central service point for procurement could “reduce or completely prevent delivery bottlenecks in the future” and make procedures more effective and efficient. However, there are rumors in police circles that this is precisely what may be contributing to the current problem – that Bavaria, as a customer that is leaving Lower Saxony in the medium term, is no longer necessarily considered a priority partner there.
Ten years for your own procurement, isn’t that quicker?
Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) announced the center in Hof in 2020 – as a component of the “home strategy” to relocate authorities to the area. Ten years from announcement to full commissioning? SPD politician Feichtmeier wonders whether construction can be accelerated. The state government had already emphasized that the creation of the center is complicated in the last electoral term in response to a state parliament question, posed at the time by Sebastian Körber (FDP). Property, IT and process management as well as personnel recruitment would “take up significant amounts of time and develop complex dependencies,” it was said at the time – so the build-up would take place gradually.
Looking back, police unionist Köhnlein hopes that the strange video campaign was an “accelerator” so that something would happen with the uniform parts. On April 1st, people dared to take this to a head; it was “a day when you forgive something like that.” By the way, formally everything went quite correctly: the police officers in the video were actors, cars and equipment rented.