The Ministry of Defence Police (Conduct, Performance and Appeals Tribunals) (Amendment) Regulations 2026, S.I. 2026/1021, were made on 10 September 2026, laid before Parliament on 15 September 2026 and come into force on 6 October 2026. The instrument applies across England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. It also states, unusually but clearly, that it has been made in part because of defects in S.I. 2020/1087 and is being issued free of charge to all known recipients of that earlier instrument. According to the explanatory note, the main policy aim is to bring the Ministry of Defence Police regime closer to the disciplinary model now used for territorial police forces in England and Wales after the Police (Conduct, Performance and Complaints and Misconduct) (Amendment) Regulations 2025. The result is a package of technical corrections, tighter drafting and several procedural changes that will matter in live conduct, performance and appeal cases from 6 October.
On conduct, the regulations first tidy the rule book. A new definition of MDP staff member is inserted into the 2020 framework, and a series of drafting fixes replace references that did not fully reflect how hearings are actually run, including repeated changes from person to person or panel. The instrument also updates definitions around senior officers so that acting-up officers and comparable officers from other relevant forces are covered more clearly. The more material change is the treatment of criminal convictions. The amended definition of gross misconduct now states that conduct resulting in a conviction for an indictable-only offence is to be treated as a breach serious enough to justify dismissal. The hearing definitions are also recast so that a misconduct meeting or hearing is framed not only around whether conduct amounts to misconduct or gross misconduct, but also around what outcome follows if that threshold is met.
A second cluster of amendments standardises service of notices. In the conduct, performance and appeals tribunal provisions, written notices and documents may now be sent by e-mail or another electronic method, with fallback rules where personal delivery or electronic service is not reasonably practicable. The regulations then spell out deemed dates of service: messages sent before 4.30 pm on a working day count that day, later messages count on the next working day, and post is deemed served on the second working day after dispatch or handover to the service provider. For professional standards teams, line managers and representatives, that change is operational rather than cosmetic. Deadlines for responses, requests and appeals will now turn more often on inbox timing rather than physical post. Case files, template letters and internal diaries will need to match the new service rules from the first day the instrument is in force.
The conduct regime also becomes more prescriptive at outcome stage. Regulation 41 is rewritten so that, where misconduct proceedings find misconduct or gross misconduct, disciplinary action must be imposed. Where neither threshold is met, the matter must either be directed into the reflective practice review process or closed with no further action. The accelerated misconduct hearing provision in regulation 62 is tightened on the same basis. Where gross misconduct is found, the default position is now dismissal without notice. A final written warning or reduction in rank remains available only where the decision-maker is satisfied that exceptional circumstances justify departing from dismissal. The explanatory note presents that as alignment with the wider police discipline model. In practice, it narrows discretion and makes the expected sanction in the most serious MDP cases much clearer.
The amendment to regulation 49 is another important conduct change. It introduces a defined test for special conditions, centred on whether documentary evidence is sufficient on the balance of probabilities to establish gross misconduct and whether the public interest requires the officer to cease to be an MDP officer without delay. It also allows the relevant authority, after receiving the investigator's report, to determine for itself whether those conditions are met, rather than relying on the previous drafting. That matters because special-condition cases are the gateway to accelerated proceedings. In other words, the instrument reduces uncertainty over when a case can move quickly into an accelerated misconduct hearing. For forces and advisers, the focus will shift to the quality of the written evidence and to how the public-interest test is recorded in the decision notice.
For former officers, Schedule 2 is extensively recast. The regulations insert a new Part 3A into the modified Conduct Regulations, creating a clearer route for cases in which an officer has retired or resigned before the disciplinary process finishes. Once the relevant authority receives the investigator's report, or where a hearing has been overtaken by resignation or retirement, it must decide whether there is a case to answer for gross misconduct and whether disciplinary proceedings should still be brought. If proceedings are taken forward, the new model creates a presumption in favour of an accelerated misconduct hearing unless the relevant authority decides that a full misconduct hearing is required or the former officer opts for the fuller route within 10 working days. A late request can still be considered if it was not reasonably practicable to act within time and the request is made before the accelerated hearing. The combined effect is to preserve a route to findings against former officers, including barred-list consequences, without automatically requiring the slower hearing format in every case. The explanatory note adds that the Ministry of Defence has produced a consolidated version of the former-officer modifications through the MDP Professional Standards Department.
The performance regime is also simplified. The regulations introduce the role of appeal manager, defined as a person appointed by the relevant authority who is senior to the officer's line manager, and remove repeated references to the second line manager. They also omit Part 4 altogether, reducing the old three-stage performance system to a two-stage model. Across the amended text, third stage meetings become second stage meetings, and related appeal language is rewritten to match. There is also a substantive change to improvement periods. Written improvement notices now carry a default period of three months, although a longer reasonable period of up to 12 months can be set where the circumstances justify it. For MDP managers, the revised structure shortens escalation routes, clarifies who hears appeals and places more weight on early, recorded assessment of whether improvement has been sufficient.
The appeals tribunal rules are amended largely as a consequence of the performance changes, including the move from third stage to second stage terminology and the same electronic service and deemed-service rules used elsewhere in the instrument. The transitional provisions are more careful than the drafting style might suggest. Pre-commencement conduct allegations, and later allegations tied to pre-commencement matters already being handled under the old conduct rules or external procedures, generally stay under the previous regime. The same is true for performance matters that came to the attention of the line manager or chief constable before 6 October 2026, and for cases already in train under the older performance rules. The carve-outs are important. The old conduct rules can still be displaced where the Director General of the Independent Office for Police Conduct orders a re-investigation or applies the newer framework to an older case, and the new conduct provisions can apply where written notice of referral to misconduct proceedings or an accelerated misconduct hearing is first given on or after 6 October 2026. The explanatory note adds that no full impact assessment was prepared because no significant effect is expected across the private, voluntary or public sector. Even so, the immediate administrative effect inside the MDP is likely to be real, because case handlers, panel members, line managers and representatives will need to work to a different rule book from that date.