Despite concluding that there were no grounds for prosecution over the deaths of four soldiers at Deepcut Barracks, yesterday's report could still lead to radical changes in Army and police practices. Stuart Mackintosh reports.

THE Surrey Police report on Deepcut identified eight key areas where there were perceived to be flaws in military procedures.

Civilian police could also learn lessons from the Deepcut deaths, according to the report, and findings will be forwarded to the Association of Chief Police Officers.

The conclusions were:

LESSONS FOR

THE ARMY

1. Supervision of young soldiers:

* In some establishments the ratio of trainees to instructors was too high.

* There were some failures to provide adequate supervision for those considered vulnerable.

* The effect of fatigue on young soldiers on guard duty must be taken into account in training.

* Attention must be paid to possible warning signs for vulnerability of trainees.

* Army selection processes were unable to identify all potentially vulnerable trainees.

There was a need to improve procedures for identifying and dealing with those who pose a risk to themselves or others.

2. Access control to lethal weapons:

* Handover of weapons between the trainees requires strict regulation.

* Frequency of guard duties needs strict regulation.

* Swapping of guard duties between trainees requires strict regulation.

* Risks of arming the trainees needs formal assessment.

* On handling of lethal weapons, correct and safe handling by trainees is to be ensured through further training and inspection.

3. Armed guards and the security threat:

* The balance of risks between the security threat and the requirement to use armed guards must be formally assessed.

* Armed trainees must not be allowed to conduct singleton patrols.

* Risks to trainees patrolling after dark are to be identified and minimised.

4. Investigation of incidents:

* The sequence of events of an incident must be clearly recorded at the time.

* Witnesses should be readily available in the event of an investigation.

* All technical and specialist means of investigation should be used.

* There must be clear and unambiguous civilian police control of the investigations.

5. Family and victim support after an incident:

* Training of casualty notification officers and casualty visiting officers requires revision.

* Personal possessions of the deceased require particularly sensitive handling.

6. Post-incident procedures:

* Command and control procedures in response to an incident must be universally understood by both the Army and the police.

* The Army's procedure for identifying lessons to be learned required revision.

7. Review of service police procedures:

* Training of the Royal Military Police to be revised.

LESSONS FOR POLICE INVESTIGATING ARMY DEATHS

* Clarity of primacy - all police forces must recognise their primacy in investigating unexplained deaths on Army establishments and full investigations that consider potential homicide must be undertaken unless and until clear evidence of another explanation is available.

* Investigative response - police officers attending must recognise the need to implement an investigative framework immediately.

* Senior screening process - all investigations of this nature should be led by a senior detective officer.

* Controlled evidence capture - the senior detective directing the investigation will consider the appropriate lines of investigation.

* Police family liaison - the responsibility of handling victims' families remains with the civil police while murder remains a valid hypothesis.

* Investigative responsibility - use of military personnel in undertaking civilian police investigations should be restricted to areas of facilitation and not the investigation itself.