Spain will reach 156,453 officers of the National Police and Civil Guard, the highest number of personnel of the State Security Forces and Corps in history, with the gradual incorporation to its police stations or barracks, during these summer days, of the latest promotions of agents who have passed the initial training process in the academies of each body.
Within this process, Extremadura will also reach the record number of agents with a total of 4,050 troops. This figure has been possible thanks to an increase in this community of 305 National Police and Civil Guard agents in the last five years, which represents an increase of 8.1% since 2017.
The previous national record high had been set in December 2011, when the State Security Forces and Corps registered a total of 155,149 troops. From that date, the National Police and Civil Guard squads experienced a sharp reduction process that led to the two squads totalling only 142,072 in December 2017. The current figure of 156,453 National Police and Civil Guard officers represents an increase of 10% compared to 2017.
The organic growth of the staff of the National Police and Civil Guard has been possible thanks to the five successive offers of public employment convened on the joint initiative of the Ministry of Finance and Public Function and the Ministry of the Interior, all of them with replacement rates greater than one hundred percent.
Operation Summer
Many of the additions of new national police and civil guards in the coming weeks will allow to reinforce the police deployment designed by the Secretary of State for Security in Operation Summer which, as every year, aims to provide effective protection to all citizens, nationals and foreigners, who come or move around Spain to enjoy their summer vacation period, as well as all activities linked to tourism.
Operation Summer starts this coming July 1 and the police deployment will be extended until August 31 in the autonomous communities of Andalusia, Asturias, Canary Islands, Cantabria, Comunitat Valenciana, Galicia, Madrid and Murcia, and in the case of Illes Balears it will be extended until September 30.
Tourism Sector Protection
This extensive police deployment aims to increase surveillance and preventive control in urban and interurban communication routes, stations, ports, airports, hotels, beaches and campsites, and in general on the occasion of those events that involve a large concentration of people. In addition, it should serve to enhance criminal prevention efforts, speed up investigations of the Judicial Police units and speed up and facilitate procedures in the complaint offices, shortening waiting times and increasing levels of public attention.
To this Operation Summer is added the reinforcement that the Civil Guard will allocate to the surveillance of the Camino de Santiago and the operation of ten Mobile Offices of Attention to the Pilgrim (OMAP), as well as the deployment of the Traffic Group in support of the special operations designed by the General Directorate of Traffic to improve road safety levels during the summer months and facilitate the mobility of citizens despite the increase of displacements of all kinds typical of these summer dates. It is also necessary to add the device of the National Police for the Camino de Santiago in its area of competence.
With Operation Summer, each year the Ministry of the Interior pays special attention to the tourism sector, one of the most important of the Spanish economic activity, which has allowed to generate for tourists, both national and foreign, that Spain is a safe destination that offers an environment of tranquility and confidence for those who choose our country as a summer destination.