AGENDA
Meeting Police and Crime Committee Date Tuesday 17 October 2017 Time 10.00 am Place Chamber, City Hall, The Queen's Walk, London, SE1 2AA Copies of the reports and any attachments may be found at www.london.gov.uk/mayor-assembly/london-assembly/police-and-crime-committee
Most meetings of the London Assembly and its Committees are webcast live at www.london.gov.uk/mayor-assembly/london-assembly/webcasts where you can also view past meetings.
Members of the Committee Steve O'Connell AM (Chairman) Len Duvall AM Unmesh Desai AM (Deputy Chair) Florence Eshalomi AM Tony Arbour AM Susan Hall AM Sian Berry AM Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM Andrew Dismore AM Peter Whittle AM
A meeting of the Committee has been called by the Chairman of the Committee to deal with the business listed below. Ed Williams, Executive Director of Secretariat Monday 9 October 2017
Further Information If you have questions, would like further information about the meeting or require special facilities please contact: Teresa Young; Telephone: 020 7983 6559; Email: [email protected]; Minicom: 020 7983 4458
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This meeting will be open to the public, except for where exempt information is being discussed as noted on the agenda. A guide for the press and public on attending and reporting meetings of local government bodies, including the use of film, photography, social media and other means is available at www.london.gov.uk/sites/default/files/Openness-in-Meetings.pdf.
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Certificate Number: FS 80233
Agenda Police and Crime Committee Tuesday 17 October 2017
1 Apologies for Absence and Chairman's Announcements
To receive any apologies for absence and any announcements from the Chairman.
2 Declarations of Interests (Pages 1 - 4)
Report of the Executive Director of Secretariat Contact: Teresa Young, [email protected]; 020 7983 6559
The Committee is recommended to:
(a) Note the list of offices held by Assembly Members, as set out in the table at Agenda Item 2, as disclosable pecuniary interests;
(b) Note the declaration by any Member(s) of any disclosable pecuniary interests in specific items listed on the agenda and the necessary action taken by the Member(s) regarding withdrawal following such declaration(s); and
(c) Note the declaration by any Member(s) of any other interests deemed to be relevant (including any interests arising from gifts and hospitality received which are not at the time of the meeting reflected on the Authority’s register of gifts and hospitality, and noting also the advice from the GLA’s Monitoring Officer set out at Agenda Item 2) and to note any necessary action taken by the Member(s) following such declaration(s).
3 Minutes (Pages 5 - 50)
The Committee is recommended to confirm the minutes of the meeting of the Police and Crime Committee held on 20 September 2017 to be signed by the Chairman as a correct record.
The appendix to the minutes set out on pages 9 to 50 is attached for Members and officers only but is available from the following area of the GLA’s website: www.london.gov.uk/mayor- assembly/london-assembly/police-and-crime-committee
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4 Summary List of Actions (Pages 51 - 60)
Report of the Executive Director of Secretariat Contact: Teresa Young, [email protected]; 020 7983 6559
The Committee is recommended to note the completed and ongoing actions arising from previous meetings of the Committee, as listed in the report.
5 Action Taken Under Delegated Authority (Pages 61 - 66)
Report of the Executive Director of Secretariat Contact: Teresa Young, [email protected]; 020 7983 6559
The Committee is recommended to note the recent action taken by the Chairman of the Police and Crime Committee under delegated authority, following consultation with the party Group Lead Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM, namely to agree the Committee’s response to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service on Access and Public Engagement Strategy consultation, and notes the response, and notes the response, attached at Appendix 1 of the report.
6 Question and Answer Session with the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service (Pages 67 - 134)
Report of the Executive Director of Secretariat Contact: Janette Roker, [email protected]; 020 7983 6562
The Committee is recommended to:
(a) Note the monthly report from the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and Metropolitan Police Service, attached at Appendix 1 to the report, as background to the question and answer session with the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service; and
(b) Note the report and answers given by the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service to the questions asked by Members.
The appendix to the report set out on pages 69 to 134 is attached for Members and officers only but is available from the following area of the GLA’s website: www.london.gov.uk/mayor- assembly/london-assembly/police-and-crime-committee
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7 Police and Crime Committee Work Programme (Pages 135 - 138)
Report of the Executive Director of Secretariat Contact: Janette Roker, [email protected]; 020 7983 6562
The Committee is recommended to:
(a) Note the work programme as set out in the report; and
(b) Delegate authority to the Chairman, in consultation with party Group Lead Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM, to write to the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime in advance of the publication of the Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy.
8 Date of Next Meeting
The next meeting of the Committee is scheduled for Wednesday, 1 November 2017 at 10am in the Chamber, City Hall.
9 Any Other Business the Chairman Considers Urgent
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This page is intentionally left blank Agenda Item 2
Subject: Declarations of Interests
Report to: Police and Crime Committee
Report of: Executive Director of Secretariat Date: 17 October 2017
This report will be considered in public
1. Summary
1.1 This report sets out details of offices held by Assembly Members for noting as disclosable pecuniary interests and requires additional relevant declarations relating to disclosable pecuniary interests, and gifts and hospitality to be made.
2. Recommendations
2.1 That the list of offices held by Assembly Members, as set out in the table below, be noted as disclosable pecuniary interests1;
2.2 That the declaration by any Member(s) of any disclosable pecuniary interests in specific items listed on the agenda and the necessary action taken by the Member(s) regarding withdrawal following such declaration(s) be noted; and
2.3 That the declaration by any Member(s) of any other interests deemed to be relevant (including any interests arising from gifts and hospitality received which are not at the time of the meeting reflected on the Authority’s register of gifts and hospitality, and noting also the advice from the GLA’s Monitoring Officer set out at below) and any necessary action taken by the Member(s) following such declaration(s) be noted.
3. Issues for Consideration
3.1 Relevant offices held by Assembly Members are listed in the table overleaf:
1 The Monitoring Officer advises that: Paragraph 10 of the Code of Conduct will only preclude a Member from participating in any matter to be considered or being considered at, for example, a meeting of the Assembly, where the Member has a direct Disclosable Pecuniary Interest in that particular matter. The effect of this is that the ‘matter to be considered, or being considered’ must be about the Member’s interest. So, by way of example, if an Assembly Member is also a councillor of London Borough X, that Assembly Member will be precluded from participating in an Assembly meeting where the Assembly is to consider a matter about the Member’s role / employment as a councillor of London Borough X; the Member will not be precluded from participating in a meeting where the Assembly is to consider a matter about an activity or decision of London Borough X.
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Member Interest Tony Arbour AM Member, LFEPA; Member, LB Richmond Jennette Arnold OBE AM Committee of the Regions Gareth Bacon AM Member, LFEPA; Member, LB Bexley Shaun Bailey AM Sian Berry AM Member, LB Camden Andrew Boff AM Congress of Local and Regional Authorities (Council of Europe) Leonie Cooper AM Member, LFEPA; Member, LB Wandsworth Tom Copley AM Unmesh Desai AM Member, LFEPA; Member, LB Newham Tony Devenish AM Member, City of Westminster Andrew Dismore AM Member, LFEPA Len Duvall AM Florence Eshalomi AM Member, LB Lambeth Nicky Gavron AM Susan Hall AM Member, LFEPA; Member, LB Harrow David Kurten AM Member, LFEPA Joanne McCartney AM Deputy Mayor Steve O’Connell AM Member, LB Croydon Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM Keith Prince AM Member, LB Redbridge Caroline Russell AM Member, LFEPA; Member, LB Islington Dr Onkar Sahota AM Navin Shah AM Fiona Twycross AM Chair, LFEPA; Chair of the London Local Resilience Forum Peter Whittle AM
[Note: LB - London Borough; LFEPA - London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority. The appointments to LFEPA reflected above take effect as from 3 April 2017]
3.2 Paragraph 10 of the GLA’s Code of Conduct, which reflects the relevant provisions of the Localism Act 2011, provides that:
- where an Assembly Member has a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest in any matter to be considered or being considered or at
(i) a meeting of the Assembly and any of its committees or sub-committees; or
(ii) any formal meeting held by the Mayor in connection with the exercise of the Authority’s functions
- they must disclose that interest to the meeting (or, if it is a sensitive interest, disclose the fact that they have a sensitive interest to the meeting); and
- must not (i) participate, or participate any further, in any discussion of the matter at the meeting; or (ii) participate in any vote, or further vote, taken on the matter at the meeting
UNLESS
- they have obtained a dispensation from the GLA’s Monitoring Officer (in accordance with section 2 of the Procedure for registration and declarations of interests, gifts and hospitality – Appendix 5 to the Code).
3.3 Failure to comply with the above requirements, without reasonable excuse, is a criminal offence; as is knowingly or recklessly providing information about your interests that is false or misleading. Page 2
3.4 In addition, the Monitoring Officer has advised Assembly Members to continue to apply the test that was previously applied to help determine whether a pecuniary / prejudicial interest was arising - namely, that Members rely on a reasonable estimation of whether a member of the public, with knowledge of the relevant facts, could, with justification, regard the matter as so significant that it would be likely to prejudice the Member’s judgement of the public interest.
3.5 Members should then exercise their judgement as to whether or not, in view of their interests and the interests of others close to them, they should participate in any given discussions and/or decisions business of within and by the GLA. It remains the responsibility of individual Members to make further declarations about their actual or apparent interests at formal meetings noting also that a Member’s failure to disclose relevant interest(s) has become a potential criminal offence.
3.6 Members are also required, where considering a matter which relates to or is likely to affect a person from whom they have received a gift or hospitality with an estimated value of at least £25 within the previous three years or from the date of election to the London Assembly, whichever is the later, to disclose the existence and nature of that interest at any meeting of the Authority which they attend at which that business is considered.
3.7 The obligation to declare any gift or hospitality at a meeting is discharged, subject to the proviso set out below, by registering gifts and hospitality received on the Authority’s on-line database. The on- line database may be viewed here: http://www.london.gov.uk/mayor-assembly/gifts-and-hospitality.
3.8 If any gift or hospitality received by a Member is not set out on the on-line database at the time of the meeting, and under consideration is a matter which relates to or is likely to affect a person from whom a Member has received a gift or hospitality with an estimated value of at least £25, Members are asked to disclose these at the meeting, either at the declarations of interest agenda item or when the interest becomes apparent.
3.9 It is for Members to decide, in light of the particular circumstances, whether their receipt of a gift or hospitality, could, on a reasonable estimation of a member of the public with knowledge of the relevant facts, with justification, be regarded as so significant that it would be likely to prejudice the Member’s judgement of the public interest. Where receipt of a gift or hospitality could be so regarded, the Member must exercise their judgement as to whether or not, they should participate in any given discussions and/or decisions business of within and by the GLA.
4. Legal Implications
4.1 The legal implications are as set out in the body of this report.
5. Financial Implications
5.1 There are no financial implications arising directly from this report.
Local Government (Access to Information) Act 1985 List of Background Papers: None Contact Officer: Teresa Young, Senior Committee Officer Telephone: 020 7983 6559 E-mail: [email protected]
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Page 4 Agenda Item 3
MINUTES
Meeting: Police and Crime Committee Date: Wednesday 20 September 2017 Time: 10.00 am Place: Chamber, City Hall, The Queen's Walk, London, SE1 2AA
Copies of the minutes may be found at: http://www.london.gov.uk/mayor-assembly/london-assembly/police-and-crime-committee
Present:
Steve O'Connell AM (Chairman) Sian Berry AM (Deputy Chair) Unmesh Desai AM Andrew Dismore AM Len Duvall AM Susan Hall AM Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM Dr Onkar Sahota AM Peter Whittle AM
1 Apologies for Absence and Chairman's Announcements (Item 1)
1.1 An apology for absence was received from Florence Eshalomi AM for whom Dr Onkar Sahota AM attended as a substitute.
2 Declarations of Interests (Item 2)
2.1 Resolved:
(a) That the list of offices held by Assembly Members, as set out in the table at Agenda Item 2, be noted as disclosable pecuniary interests; and
(a) That it be noted that Andrew Dismore AM declared a disclosable pecuniary
City Hall, The Queen’s Walk, London SE1 2AA Enquiries: 020 7983 4100 minicom: 020 7983 4458 www.london.gov.uk Page 5 Greater London Authority Police and Crime Committee Wednesday 20 September 2017
interest in respect of Agenda Item 5 (Question and Answer Session with the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service) in so far as the discussion pertained to the route of Notting Hill Carnival arising from his interest in a property on the route of the Carnival. [Note: In the event, Notting Hill Carnival was not discussed at the meeting].
3 Summary List of Actions (Item 3)
3.1 The Committee received the report of the Executive Director of Secretariat.
3.2 Resolved:
That the completed actions and ongoing actions arising from the previous meetings of the Committee, as listed in the report, be noted.
4 Question and Answer Session with the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service (Item 4)
4.1 The Committee received the report of the Executive Director of Secretariat as background to the questions and answer session with the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) and the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS).
4.2 The Chairman welcomed the following guests to the meeting: Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London and occupant of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime; Sophie Linden, Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime; and Martin Hewitt QPM, Assistant Commissioner, MPS.
4.3 A transcript of the discussion is attached at Appendix 1.
4.4 During the course of the discussion, the Mayor: Reiterated the commitment to keep the Committee informed about the forthcoming knife prevention media campaign; Agreed to explore the idea of establishing a domestic abuser register; Agreed to provide an explanation of the calculation that an additional £2 is spent on policing for every £1 spent on counter terrorism, following a terrorist incident in London; and Agreed to take on board the comments raised by Unmesh Desai AM about the messaging to the public concerning the proposed closure of some police stations as
Page 6 Greater London Authority Police and Crime Committee Wednesday 20 September 2017
set out in the MOPAC and MPS Public Access and Engagement Strategy consultation, particularly around the perception that it will reduce the number of police officers in an area.
4.5 The Chairman stated that the Committee would like to receive an update on the number of responses received to the Public Access and Engagement Strategy consultation once the consultation period had ended.
4.6 During the course of the discussion, the Assistant Commissioner, MPS, undertook to: Provide data on the response times for S (significant) priority calls in the pathfinder boroughs; and Provide data on: o Which wards currently have an uplift in Dedicated Ward Officers (including how many officers are in that uplift) and which wards are planned to have an uplift as a result of the creation of Borough Command areas; and o Which local authorities are contributing financially to an uplift in Dedicated Ward Officers, in which wards, and how many officers.
4.7 The Chairman stated that he would write to the Metropolitan Police Service, following consultation with party Group Lead Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM in relation to the proposed creation of policing hubs within Borough Command Units.
4.8 The Chairman informed the Committee that the Commissioner, MPS, would attend the Committee’s next monthly question and answer session on 17 October 2017 and he would write to her regarding the Committee’s questions on Notting Hill Carnival.
4.9 At the end of the discussion the Chairman thanked the guests for their attendance and helpful contributions.
4.10 Resolved:
(a) That the monthly report from the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime, attached at Appendix 1 of the report, be noted;
(b) That the report and answers given by the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime and the MPS to the questions asked by Members be noted;
(c) That the Chairman, following consultation with the party Group Lead Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM, write to the Commissioner, MPS, regarding the proposed local policing hubs; and
(d) That the Chairman write the guests requesting the follow-up information as
Page 7 Greater London Authority Police and Crime Committee Wednesday 20 September 2017
outlined in paragraphs 4.4 to 4.6 above.
5 Police and Crime Committee Work Programme (Item 5)
5.1 The Committee received the report of the Executive Director of Secretariat.
5.2 Resolved:
(a) That the work programme as set out in the report be noted; and
(b) That it be noted that Members undertook a site visit to Bethnal Green Police Station, as part of the Committee’s scrutiny review of antisocial behaviour in London, on 6 September 2017.
6 Date of Next Meeting (Item 6)
6.1 The date of the next meeting was scheduled for Thursday, 5 October 2017 at 10am in the Chamber, City Hall.
7 Any Other Business the Chairman Considers Urgent (Item 7)
7.1 There was no other business the Chairman considered urgent.
8 Close of Meeting
8.1 The meeting ended at 12.32pm.
Chairman Date
Contact Officer: Teresa Young; Telephone: 020 7983 6559; Email: [email protected]; Minicom: 020 7983 4458
Page 8 Appendix 1
Police and Crime Committee – 20 September 2017
Transcript of Agenda Item 4: Question and Answer Session with the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and Metropolitan Police Service
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Can we welcome our guests to our monthly question-and-answer session? We understand, Mr Mayor, that you are having to leave at around 12 o’clock. We will try to work our questions around that. If we have any other questions thereafter, clearly, we have the Deputy Mayor [for Policing and Crime] and Assistant Commissioner (AC) Hewitt to help us.
First of all, I shall lead off the questions. At the top of the list, the top priority, clearly, is protecting Londoners from terrorism. We have had only very recently the incident at Parsons Green. First of all, I would like to turn to AC Hewitt to provide us with an update on the Metropolitan Police Service’s (MPS) investigations into that recent incident, please.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, Metropolitan Police Service (MPS): Obviously, you will understand I will not go into any specific detail, but Members may have received the update just before coming into the room this morning. Two further people have been arrested in Wales and so that brings us to a situation where we have five people currently in custody. The search that was taking place at Hounslow has now been completed in the commercial premises, and we have two searches still going on at the two addresses in Surrey and two searches now going on in Wales in relation to the individuals who have been arrested this morning. After the response that everyone will have seen on Friday, it is still a very fast-moving and national investigation. The Counterterrorism Command here is working very closely with the Welsh Counterterrorism Unit and the forces in Wales and obviously with the Surrey Police as well. We are in the midst of the investigation. You will understand I cannot go into any more detail around that, but it is progressing and progressing at speed.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Thank you very much. Clearly, physical measures have been and are being put in place to attempt to prevent terrorist incidents. Does the nature of this particular incident change any other way that you need to address prevention at all or tactics at all?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): We have seen for some time with the attacks that have happened around the world that they are various in the methods and the means that the attackers are using. There is a lot of thinking that goes on within the counterterrorism world as to how you can better protect individuals, communities and places from potential attacks and we have seen a range of tactics being used in London in the attacks we have had most recently, but of course Friday’s event takes us back to the issue that we had at North Greenwich Tube Station in similar sorts of circumstances. We are looking at all the available means that we have to prevent these kinds of attacks. Clearly, in open spaces and crowded spaces there have been various physical mitigation measures put in place and that work continues to look around where we have crowded spaces. The proactive work with the intelligence agencies in relation to those people who will seek to do attacks similar to the one that we had on Friday, will continue.
Of course, it fundamentally takes you into the space, when you look at the attacks that have happened in London, in terms of how we are active in terms of preventing people being radicalised and dealing with those people that we fear are being radicalised. An enormous range of activity is taking place within the Counterterrorism Command here and, as you will be aware, Mark Rowley QPM [AC, MPS) has the national lead
Page 9 for the Counterterrorism Network and is working very closely with all the other agencies that are involved in trying to prevent these acts.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Turning now to you, Mr Mayor, at the weekend the level was raised, in fact, to ‘critical’, temporarily, as it turned out, and this caused Londoners great concern when they read and saw about that. They may have sensed that things were moving, literally, to another level. In that context, it was reduced back down again by the Prime Minister [the Rt Hon Theresa May MP].
Are you, as a responsible individual, satisfied that in tackling terrorism London is protected in the context of AC Hewitt’s remarks and also adequately prepared for any future attacks?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Thank you, Chairman. It is good to be at the Police and Crime Committee. Can I respond with the first part of your question about the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre (JTAC) analysis of threat levels?
JTAC is an independent body, no political interference, no involvement from politicians at either national level or London politicians. It looks at the threat levels across the country and for the last few years now, since 2014, it has been at ‘severe’. That means an attack is highly likely. There have been two occasions - and Martin will correct me if I get this wrong - in the recent past when it is gone from ‘severe’ to ‘critical’. That means from highly likely to imminent. The two occasions, Chairman, when it has gone to ‘critical’ were the short period after the Manchester bomb attack, the Ariana Grande [concert] bomb attack, and for a short period, after the Parsons Green attack.
I have to be careful what I say for the reasons that Martin alluded to, but in general terms the reason why it tends to go from ‘severe’ to ‘critical’ is if the experts believe that in general terms, there are still other people who could be around or, for example, the bomb-making factory has not been dealt with, speaking in general terms. I attended the COBRA1 meeting chaired by the Prime Minister on Friday and was reassured by the expert advice around the table, including from Mark Rowley QPM [AC, MPS], that everything that could be done in that period of time, was being done.
The second part of your question is: in general terms, are we as safe as we can be? We are doing all that we can do within the resources that we have to keep our city safe. I say this, though: we cannot sub-contract to our 30,000 police officers and our intelligence services the job to keep us safe. All of us have a responsibility to do our bit to keep ourselves safe. If you bear in mind 30,000 to 31,000 police officers is good, but 8.7 million Londoners assisting the police is much better. Look at the last year alone. There has been an attack on a concert; there have been attacks in Tube stations, there has been an attack on two bridges, an attack on a market, an attack outside a mosque. The attempts terrorists make are to kill, injure and maim civilians and wherever civilians we have to take steps to keep ourselves safe. With the resources that I have at my disposal and the team working for me, I am reassured that we are doing all we can to keep our city safe.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Thank you, Mr Mayor. Talking about the prevention aspect, you commissioned Lord Toby Harris, a former colleague of mine on the Metropolitan Police Authority, to provide a report around London’s capacity2. That was, in essence, a year ago and we are awaiting publication [of your response] very shortly, I suggest. Would you like to comment on the parts of that report that have been implemented and give us a feeling about when we may see the full report issued, to give us some confidence and reassurance?
1 Cabinet Office Briefing Room A (COBRA) is the Government’s emergency committee.
2 London’s preparedness to respond to a major terrorist incident, published on 28 October 2016.
Page 10
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Sure. Thank you. One of the first things I did as Mayor was to seek reassurance around the preparedness of us to deal with a terror attack on London. Lord Harris was sent away to do that piece of work and came back with a number of recommendations.
The good news is that more than a third of the recommendations he made have been implemented. The bad news is that a number of recommendations were not for me or for London but were national things; they were to do with the Port of London and other bodies. The good news is that we are making good progress in either implementing the other recommendations or having a response. This autumn - I would expect next month - we will publish a response in relation to the recommendations and where we are on implementing those. Some of those, for example, are to do with schools, some are around airports, some are around the River Thames, and are not directly the purview of the Mayor. However, I would hope Londoners will be reassured by the collegiate way the government family and the security family have been working together to make sure that we are as safe as we possibly can be.
I tell you this. There are cities around the world that come to us for advice and expertise and assistance because of the recognition that we do a remarkable job keeping the global city that we are, as safe as we can.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Of the 118-odd recommendations, as you say, many were outside the purview of this building, but it is good that you are committing to publish the report in, say, October, hopefully, and we can see those that are being implemented, those that are in hand and those that perhaps were too much of an ask. We look forward to that and commenting on that as a Committee. It is pleasing that you are saying that, in your estimation, London is prepared in that respect for any future terrorist event.
AC Hewitt, you have given reassurance that AC Rowley has the resources available to him, again, to protect Londoners.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Can I, if I may, Chairman, just make one comment on that? It is much more than just the resources that Mark Rowley has with him and it really is important that the response to terrorism both in a preventive sense and then very much in a response sense when there has been an incident is a whole-policing system response. Those people who are badged as working within counterterrorism have very critical roles, but the rest of the organisation comes into play and has a very vital role in the response. When you look at what happened on Friday and, sadly, over the summer period, we have become very practiced at how we respond to an incident, but the work that then goes on in every community in terms of reassuring at iconic sites and, in this instance, at travel sites and then going and working directly with communities that will be particularly impacted or particularly concerned; the work that then kicks in around how we deal with potential instances of hate crime as a result of events; and then the ongoing work, in this instance, when we went to ‘critical’. It is a whole-organisation response and, again, in this one we have seen it on a national level as well. That is an important point when people talk about responding to terrorism.
Of course, at the very base of it all is that day-to-day engagement that we have with communities in terms of understanding what is going on in communities and giving people that confidence to come and talk to us about issues that are concerning them.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Exactly, and we are going to ask one or two questions around that to the Mayor?
Unmesh Desai AM: I have two questions. Good morning, Mr Mayor. The Harris report came out sometime last year, September, I think.
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Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): October.
Unmesh Desai AM: We have been told for quite some time now - and the Chairman has already asked you about this - that the report will be published soon, sometime in October. Do you have a date for publication of your response to the report?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): The report has been published.
Unmesh Desai AM: Yes.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): The response to the recommendations is what I am talking about. I would expect to publish the response to the recommendations in October.
Unmesh Desai AM: You do not have a date? October is just around the corner.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): No. If we printed it today, things are so fluid in relation to other implementation, but we think October.
Unmesh Desai AM: All right, but your response will be published sometime in October?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): The progress made will be published in October, yes.
Unmesh Desai AM: Secondly, Mr Mayor, you talked about other cities around the world looking, quite rightly, to London and the work that both you at a political level and the MPS are doing to combat the terrorist threat.
The Mayor of Nice, Christian Estrosi, is calling a conference of leaders of cities across Europe to look at ways of responding to such threats and particularly better safeguard against vehicle attacks. This was reported in the press last month in The Guardian and in The Washington Post. In language that must have seemed very familiar to you, he said that some €30 million had been spent on protecting potential target areas in the city from possible vehicle attack since last year but cities needed more money to cope with the new threats. He went on to say - and this could be interpreted in different ways but I know but what he meant from the press reports that I read - and I quote, “We will not win the war with the rules of peace”, but he very specifically made a plea to the French central government for more resources. As I say, that is language that will be very familiar to you. At this conference, apart from European counterparts, there will also be in attendance, as I understand, European Commissioner Julian King, who is in charge of European Union (EU) security matters.
I did mention this conference to your Deputy Mayor [for Policing and Crime] and, if you recall, I mentioned it to you in the lift last week going up from the Assembly. Are you aware of this conference? Will you be planning to go to it or send someone to it? It is only around the corner. It is on 28 and 29 September 2017.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Sure. Let me answer that. I am not going but let me answer the question this way. I have personally and we have lots of good co-operation with our colleagues across Europe. I met the EU Commissioner Julian King when I was in Brussels and I also met the mayors of various cities across Europe. However, you are right to remind all of us that the shift in attempts by terrorists to attack us is one that has been seen across Europe: Barcelona, Brussels, Paris, Stockholm, Rotterdam and other cities across Europe. This initiative from the Mayor of Nice is one I welcome.
Page 12 We do lots of cross-border work all the time. One of the things we do is give advice on best practice and we are ready to do so and also to learn from other cities across Europe. AC Mark Rowley QPM regularly visits other cities across Europe and across the world to get the best advice, to pinch good ideas, to see what others are doing. One of the things we will continue to do is to do that.
That particular conference I will not be attending, but we will make sure that we get a good read-out in relation to any ideas from the conference and things we can learn.
Hostile vehicle mitigation is one of the things that cities across Europe are doing. One of the things the Chairman alluded to was the work around Prevent. We are, imperfect as we are, a world leader when it comes to addressing the issue of preventing radicalisation and so ideas we can give to other colleagues across Europe we will do so regularly.
Unmesh Desai AM: We have some questions coming up on Prevent and radicalisation and extremism programmes.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Sure.
Tony Arbour AM: Mr Hewitt, were you in any way limited by a lack of resources in dealing with the incident at Parsons Green?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): No. In terms of dealing with that specific incident, I am confident that we had the resources available. Clearly, the initial response was conducted by both MPS officers and British Transport Police officers because of where it occurred and we were able to get control of that scene very quickly and deal with what inevitably was a very chaotic and confusing scenario. As soon as that situation had been declared as a terrorist incident, which happened very quickly after the initial reaction, then the Counterterrorism Command swing in with all the resources that they will bring in to start to conduct the initial investigation. Therefore, in relation to that particular incident last Friday, I am comfortable that we had enough resources to deal with what we needed to deal with. It was, in a sense, very self-contained in the geography of it. It was a very self-contained incident. It becomes an incredibly large investigation and then, as I alluded to earlier, we kick off a whole range of activities all over the city, but we were able to deal with that one comfortably on Friday.
Tony Arbour AM: Thank you. You referred to “in that incident”. Are you suggesting that there have been occasions when you have not had sufficient resources?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): I am suggesting that some of the incidents that we have had have clearly been far more complex and far more spread and we ended up in a situation where we have a more fluid response that is required. We have responded very effectively to all of the terrorist incidents that have occurred in London over the summer period or since March and, for that matter, as have the Greater Manchester Police in relation to the incident with the bombing up there. We have responded very well. We have been able to put the right resources - be that counterterrorism resources, armed officers or general police officers - to deal with the situation, in place, but it would be untrue to suggest that that does not stretch the organisation. Of course, it would stretch the organisation. They are very large operations, they are very complex, they move fast and they endure for a considerable period of time, but we have been able, I think, to respond very effectively to all of the incidents that have occurred in London.
Page 13 Tony Arbour AM: You suggested that when counterterrorism swings in, I would not say you are going from famine to feast but are you saying that once the thing has been declared as a terrorist incident, instantly more resources become available to you?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Of course, because what they bring is the specialist teams that are there specifically to deal with terrorist investigations. They have a range of capability that is used exclusively to deal with terrorist incidents. Once we know that an incident is of a terrorist nature or is suspected of being of a terrorist nature, then it brings those resources, in the same way that we would bring specialist resources to any number of other incidents.
Tony Arbour AM: Thank you. In relation to counterterrorism, has there ever been any suggestion that it has been under-resourced either in terms of finances or manpower?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): I suspect that if AC Mark Rowley QPM were here he would always say that he could use more resources and there are always additional things that we can do, but it is an area where there has been a focus for resourcing. As I say, I guess I go back to the fact that we have had probably the most challenging period that we can remember and that we have coped adequately with both the response and the investigations into those incidents.
Tony Arbour AM: Yes, I do not think there is anyone here who would suggest that you have not coped well. In the public service people will always say they could do with more, a bit like Oliver Twist. You can always do with more.
Can you think of anything that London is lacking or counterterrorism is lacking that resources could provide?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): I do not really. There is not a specific area that I would go to and I would say that this is an area that Mark -- and as you would imagine, within the counterterrorism world, it is not an area that is openly discussed across the piece.
One of the single biggest challenges that we all have - and this would go across for policing generally - is our capability to deal with digital evidence and the amount of digital evidence now that exists in almost any investigation that we undertake. It exists in low-level volume crime investigations because so much of what is happening with people will be happening on their phones and so on. Particularly in terrorist investigations, there is an enormous amount of digital forensic work that goes on.
Tony Arbour AM: But that has nothing to do with money.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Everything has something to do with money because we only have the resources that we have.
Tony Arbour AM: Yes, but what you were describing is something you would need to train people to do and have them able to do it.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): It requires resource and assets.
Tony Arbour AM: To your knowledge, has there ever been an occasion when the MPS has had to request extra resources and it has been denied to them, in relation to terrorism?
Page 14 Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Not to my knowledge. As you will be aware, the terrorism network is a national network and, as we have seen over the last couple of days, the arrests that we have done in Wales have been supported by the Welsh counterterrorism unit as well as officers from the local forces. I cannot think of an example when we have not been able to really have the asset provided to assist where it has been deemed necessary for that to happen.
Tony Arbour AM: Can I ask you, Mr Mayor and the Deputy Mayor? Can you think of an occasion when you have asked for money to assist in terrorism matters and it has been refused?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Can I reassure you? One of the benefits of the COBRA system is that the Prime Minister chairs the meeting and what has been remarkable - and I have observed now for 16 months, I am afraid, too often - is the collegiate way the government family and also the security family comes together.
I will give you an example. The Secretary of State for Defence will stand up - this is something called Operation Temperer; it is not a secret I am giving away - and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) will offer up skilled officers who are - I do not wish to cause offence to them - backfilled, basically, in relation to some of the buildings and people that the police look after, the protection team, and that allows the police to then front-fill to make sure we are safe.
What is remarkable about that - and I say this as somebody who is relatively new to the COBRA system when it comes to counterterror - is the collegiality not just cross-country and across departments but all those silos disappear and there is a real sense of grown-upness when it comes to a terrorist act. I have been impressed at all the COBRA meetings at how everyone just gets on with it. What was remarkable on the two occasions when it went from ‘severe’ to ‘critical’ was the planning and preparation. You just press a button and, just to reassure Londoners and also those around the country, our response to counterterrorism is something we should be really proud of.
Tony Arbour AM: It would be wrong to say, would it - and I am simply referring to terrorism matters and security matters - that you could ever claim that it is under-resourced and that the Government in terms of your collegiality would ever be backwards in providing the resources to deal with the matter adequately?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): There are two separate issues which we cannot blur. One is the response to a specific attack; two is terrorism generally. Experts like Dave Thompson QPM [Chief Constable, West Midlands Police] from the National Police Constabularies, Craig Mackey [QPM, Deputy Commissioner, MPS] and others have talked about the fact that you cannot disaggregate counterterror policing from policing. The example Craig Mackey gave at the last Police and Crime Committee3 was that you could say radiology has fantastic funding but that does not mean the National Health Service (NHS) is well funded.
To give you a simple example, the Chairman referred to Prevent. I know we will talk about this later on, but the ability of us to have good community policing allows the counterterror teams to receive the intelligence because of the confidence the public has from that. To give you another example from the response to the Westminster Bridge attack, some work was done which showed that only, roughly speaking, one third of the officers who responded were from the counterterror team; the other two thirds were from mainstream policing. At the Manchester bombing, it was far higher and we provided support there as well. There are specific examples of immediacy, brilliant teamwork and good collegiality.
3 This refers to the meeting of the Committee on 20 July 2017.
Page 15 People phone in. Police officers phone and say, “Can I come in and help out?” People cancel their leave. People go up above and beyond. You can do that for a short period of time but it is not sustainable.
Therefore, in general terms, as far as terrorism, I rely upon the expert advice from Craig Mackey, Dave Thompson - who is a Chief Constable - and others. For specific incidents, my personal experience is that we are very good.
Tony Arbour AM: It would never be appropriate in your experience to say that, in terms of a response to terrorism, it would fall short because of lack of resources?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): I can answer it again if you want.
Tony Arbour AM: No, I understand what you are getting at. You are saying - and indeed Mr Hewitt has said - that in responding to an incident ordinary police officers are taken off their ordinary duties to deal with the matter. I do understand that, but I am talking about the response when the incident occurs. It could never be said in your experience that the response by the police and the security service was lacking because of a lack of resources?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): In, unfortunately, the four incidents we have had in London since I have been the Mayor, the response has been fantastic. I have no criticisms at all.
Tony Arbour AM: All right. Thank you very much.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): I am going to bring Len in. The point here to be thinking about is the response to an incident by the emergency services has been incredibly effective post-incident and there is no doubt around that. There is a separate debate, which we are getting on to, around the Prevent piece, is preventing terrorism with the assistance of 8 million Londoners. There is an acceptance around abstraction --
Len Duvall AM: That is what I want to talk about.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): I will not steal your thunder but there is an exception - well, I will do a bit - there is an exception around abstraction from our ward teams for specific events. That has just been highlighted. Len, I do not want to completely steal your thunder.
Len Duvall AM: I am glad we clarified. When we talk about extra resources, it is about redeploying the people that you have. You do not have extra teams. It is taking people off the day-to-day tasks in times of woe, to do it. It is not extra. It is actually redeployment and the right priority in times of woe.
What we really want to understand is on the abstraction issue - because that is one of the challenges. Life does not stand still while we deal with terrorism acts and crime carries on - that you have the suitable focus and challenge internally in the organisation to make sure that we have a sensible abstraction policy that is used in times of woe for the right purposes and they go back to their day jobs as quickly as possible. Can you give us that assurance that that is the case? In times of woe, it is very difficult and we all support it because that is what you need to do. It is about the capacity of policing that we are talking about.
There are two dual aims, it seems, on military support in terms of - and the Mayor said it - backfilling roles or freeing up other people to do other issues. It is also about a Prevent activity there. I can see that. Equally, I can see a time when the MPS is going to call on - and you have probably called on - some specialists in other
Page 16 constabularies to come in and when you may need to call on more mainstream resources to help the policing of London.
Is that constantly under review? Can you give us assurance that there really is a sensible way that you are carrying out abstractions? We have made some terrible mistakes in the past and it does depend on the leadership who is seeing that. Who is holding the ring on that? Is that at your level or is that somewhere further down the food chain? We just want to be assured that someone is keeping an eye on this.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): I can assure you that someone is keeping an eye on that. If we take perhaps the sequence of events and what would happen in one of those particularly difficult scenarios, you will get something like Friday that will happen. It will become fairly clear fairly quickly what we are dealing with and, as I said in response to the last question, it would be declared as a counterterrorism issue.
There is a group that sits routinely, but will sit as a special case if we get an attack, which is the Security Review Committee. That is internal meeting, chaired by a Deputy Assistant Commissioner. In response to what we think the incident is telling us we need to do, that Committee will start saying, “We need this level of resource”. You understandably have your immediate dealing with the scene. You then potentially - and if you think of the events that we have had - have a number of other scenes. You may have hospitals; you may have a man-hunt; you have a whole range of things. That Committee, at which there will be senior representation from the rest of the organisation and particularly my bit of the organisation, which has the majority of the staff working locally in boroughs, will fund what the requirement is.
As you rightly point out, what that will also be doing is setting a requirement nationally because every terrorist incident has an impact and so the same discussions will be going on around the country. We then end up with two things. We end up with how we are going to respond to the actual incident and where we need to put people, and then what we would describe as what our policing posture is going to be for the rest of normal policing while we are dealing with this particular incident. As I said earlier, we would be dealing with all the community reassurance and all the other factors that we would be playing with.
That meeting will routinely sit - and by that I mean probably twice a day - reviewing what we have to do in terms of resources and how we are managing resources. I can absolutely assure you, that from my side of the table - because what will be sitting above that will be the Management Board with the Commissioner [Cressida Dick QPM], Mark Rowley and us lot - from my side of the table I am pushing continually about how I want my people back because they need to be back doing what they are doing because it is putting increased pressure on the officers and staff where they are, so we work through that process.
Clearly, if you get, as we had in Friday’s incident, a movement of the threat level, ‘critical’ has a number of things that happen with it; but we are very measured - and we have become, sadly, much more experienced at this over the last six months - we are very measured in the way that we respond because of course it is great jumping up to things but it is actually quite hard coming back down. The Mayor alluded to the fact that we work with other countries. We had very interesting discussions with both Paris and Brussels about the difficulties they have had with coming down from a really high level because it then becomes a public reassurance issue. We are very measured in the way that we do that. The Security Review Committee meeting is routinely deciding and then from my side we will be pushing, saying, “When can we release?”
Just on the final point, we will bring people in from the counterterrorism network and we will occasionally bring in expertise for an incident into London. I know we are going to talk later about the Grenfell [Tower] Fire but we have bought a number of experts in for some of the things we have needed to do in relation to that investigation. We are not at a stage where we need to bring in, if you like, general policing and we
Page 17 certainly have not got anywhere close to that in the last few incidents, but that would always be something that we would consider. What you have sitting in the National Police Chiefs’ Council is, if you like, the resourcing hub. Where a force has an incident that it feels is going to stretch it to the point where it may need mutual assistance, they put their bid into the resourcing hub at Victoria Street and they will then bring people in from different parts of the country, but I can assure you that we have a very rigorous process. Certainly, coming in from my angle, we are constantly challenging and pushing about releasing our officers as quickly as you can when it is safe to do so, so that they can go back and do their normal duties.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Just to add, Len, two seconds’ worth, on Friday the conversations I was having with senior police was about how we have football matches in London and London Fashion Week in London, in addition to the various needs there are and there is a - small T - tension in relation to me saying, “We have to deal with the terror stuff but there is other stuff, business as usual, that is taking place as well”.
Len Duvall AM: Thank you.
Peter Whittle AM: Mr Mayor, you are the symbolic head of London and a lot of people listen to you. In the question earlier, you were asked about whether you thought London was adequately protected and you basically said yes. Do not you think, therefore, that people will start to get rather worried that you think it is adequately protected as things stand? It is that complacency, really.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Sure. I understand the point you are alluding to, which is that balance to be struck between being vigilant and alert but never complacent. The language used by Neil Basu [Deputy Assistant Commissioner, MPS] recently was that we are not seeing a spike here in relation to terrorist attacks; we are seeing a shift: Barcelona, Paris, Brussels, Stockholm, London, Manchester. Just looking at the last quarterly figures I have, the last figures we have show the number of people arrested for terrorism-related offences rose 68% to a record 379 in the 12 months before June, the highest number of terrorist arrests since records began, and a number of people have been charged and prosecuted. That is the context. Therefore, the question is: with the resources we have, are we using them the best we can? The answer is yes.
There is a separate point: do we need more resources? Yes. I have been saying for the last 16 months that London needs more resources. The cuts that have been made are not sustainable and our ability to keep our city safe is made harder by these cuts. I have been saying for the last 16 months that the Government has to do a U-turn and reverse these cuts so we can keep our city safe.
However, are we one of the safest global cities in the world? Yes. Do we have the best police service in the world? Yes. Could we do with more police officers? Yes.
Peter Whittle AM: The thing is, though, Mr Mayor, this will come as rather a surprise to people when you say that we are in the one of the safest cities in the world.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Globally.
Peter Whittle AM: Globally. The fact is that you say we have had a spike --
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): A shift.
Peter Whittle AM: -- a shift, but these things are going to happen more and more. Basically, what you are saying is that essentially, going forward, it is just going to have to be normalised? Essentially, what is happening is that your response is, “We are adequately protected enough and this is how we will respond
Page 18 going forward”, but the fact is that there are simply going to be more and more incidents, but your approach will not necessarily change.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Firstly, to be fair, Peter, that is not what I said. Terrorism should never be normalised. Terrorism is --
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): We did not hear that, Mr Mayor. We did not hear about normalisation. I did not hear that. Continue. I was challenging my colleague [Assembly Member] Whittle, sorry.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Sure. What is important is that we are doing what we can to deal with a situation where there is increased activity by terrorists who want to kill, injure and maim. We cannot pretend it is not happening. There is a discussion we are going to have shortly about the Prevent side of this, but we have to take action to make sure we do what we can to deal with the other parts of, if you like, the spectrum, which is the policing side, the security side and the prosecution side. Of course, it should never be normalised but I have to accept the fact that recently cities across the Western world have been attacked by terrorists.
The good news is we are thwarting many attacks. If you look between the murder of Fusilier Lee Rigby and March of this year, 13 terrorist attempts were thwarted. If you look between March of this year and now, there have been six terrorist attempts thwarted and, I am afraid, four ‘successful’ terrorist attacks in London. That is 10 in the space of a few months versus 13 in the space of four years. You can pretend it is not happening, but it is happening.
In my job as the Mayor, my biggest priority is keeping our city safe. I will be an advocate, lobbyist and champion in relation to more resources for these guys, but also I will be saying to Londoners that we have a role to play as well. Eight point seven million eyes and ears are more powerful than 31,000 eyes and ears.
Peter Whittle AM: I will just ask you and this is it then. Finally, basically, we have what we have, but would you not think of something, for example, like making sure that many more policemen are armed. In the case of the Borough High Street attack, one of the police officers tried to fend these people off with a baton. Surely it requires a complete shift in the way that we look at this these.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Maybe I will let AC Hewitt answer the question about whether he thinks having 30,000 police officers with guns makes us more safe or less safe.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): I do not think that we are pushing at all for routine arming of police officers. As a result - and I can remember - after the November 2015 attacks in Paris on the Bataclan and the Stade de France - we sat down as a management board to look at, if we had a multi-seated event like that in London, would we have enough armed officers to get to the scenes quickly enough to deal with the offenders and we realised that we did not.
We embarked then on a programme of armed uplift, as it is called, to give us considerably greater levels of officers who are patrolling as armed response officers and officers who are also more specialist counterterrorism firearms officers. We have been through an accelerated programme to get those officers in place. They are highly trained; they are very visible. You will have noticed the higher level of armed response vehicles particularly in iconic sites and they are able to respond very quickly. We have seen in all the incidents that we have had, sadly, over the summer, extremely quick responses by those officers and I have to say, in terms of the attack at London Bridge, also with colleagues from the City of London Police whom we work very closely with, which is great, and equally we work with the British Transport Police.
Page 19 The fundamental issue that sits underneath all of this is our relationship with the communities of London if we have communities that are confident to talk to us about concerns they have about counterterrorism. That relationship is helped by the fact that the police are largely and routinely unarmed. We have about 9% of our officers who are armed. They are all highly trained. They are specific to the role that they undertake. They are in a position to deal with situations. We have demonstrated very clearly that we are able to deal with those situations.
Everyday policing in London does not require a police officer to carry a firearm. It brings with it many more challenges than it solves. We need to have our officers being able to protect themselves and there are a range of less lethal options that we provide officers so that they are able to deal with the kinds of situations that we face.
What you described at Borough Market, was less a lack of armed officers but more about police officers, both off duty and in the case you described of the British Transport Police officer on duty, who saw their duty to go and try and protect people in very, very dangerous circumstances. I admire them for doing that. Those examples do not take us to a place where we want to try and have every police officer walking around with a firearm and all the training and community relation implications that would come with that.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Peter, I am going to move on now.
That takes us nicely into the Prevent discussions. Susan, did you have a very quick question? We need to move on.
Susan Hall AM: It is very quick, yes. We are very honoured, really, in this Committee to know exactly what the police are doing, we know the resources you have, we know the skills that you have and we admire and thank you for that. I believe that the people of London need reassurance from their Mayor. Therefore, do you think it is appropriate that the first things that came out of your mouth after the Parsons Green event are comments upon the funding of the MPS? Do you not think at that time you should have been reassuring the public? The public do not have the amount of information we have about the resources and the abilities of our police. Yes or no? Do you think you should have just gone straight in for the funding or not?
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): It is a fair question, Mr Mayor.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): It is not a yes/no question, Chairman, with respect --
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): It is a fair enough question. Comment on it, please.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): I am quite clear that if I am asked a direct question on whether our police have enough resources, the answer is no. If I am asked a question, I like to give a direct answer. The answer is that our police did a brilliant job on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and today. Do I think we are more safe if we have more resources? Yes. Do I believe the Conservative Party is to blame? Yes.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): We will move on, but the point was a well-made one because people out there do not have the access to information that many do have. At that heightened time of worry and concern, the question was whether it was appropriate to say at that particular time, “Is there enough money?” Let us move on to Prevent now.
We have already alluded to engagement with Londoners and getting eight million Londoners to support us in the cause of preventing terrorism. This Committee has busied itself in the past challenging the previous and
Page 20 this Mayor around preventing extremism and around greater engagement with Londoners. The question is initially to the Mayor and I know Caroline [Pidgeon MBE AM] is going to come in with some more questions.
We have recommended that there needs to be greater engagement and openness with Londoners about tackling extremism. Is this something, Mr Mayor, you accept can be done? Over the period of your mayoralty, what have you been doing to encourage it?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Firstly, Chairman, I revisited in preparation for the Police and Crime Committee a report you - in a different composition - did in December 2015. I say this in a non-patronising way: it is an excellent report, with a number of recommendations that hopefully you will see we are implementing. We have taken on board some of the recommendations you made, even though it was a previous Committee before our administration: some of the stuff that Sophie [Linden, Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime] has been doing around the CONTEST Board, the work working with the London Crime Prevention Board, the work we are doing around neighbourhood policing, the work we are doing working with those who lead the London Councils response to Prevent; it is implementing some of the stuff you talked about.
However, I am not going to pretend we are not frustrated in relation to the delay in the Government’s CONTEST strategy. We are frustrated in relation to the response to [Dame] Louise Casey’s excellent report [The Casey Review into Opportunity and Integration, 2016] but, by and large, we think preventing young people being radicalised is really important. It is not the case, as much as we would like to think it is the case, that the people who are trying to kill, injure and maim us come from somewhere else to this country to blow us up or to stab us or to do all things they have been doing. I am afraid the bad news is that there are people born and raised in our city who are, if you like, groomed and radicalised and we have to do a far better job at stopping them being radicalised. There is always more work we can do.
It is not simply a policing issue; it is not simply a City Hall issue. There is there is a role for us to play providing leadership. At the moment, that pan-London leadership does not fall with City Hall for reasons you will appreciate. There are statutory duties on local authorities and others. We are in discussions with the Home Office in relation to trying to improve the position of Prevent in London.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): I shall bring Caroline [Pidgeon MBE AM] in and Unmesh [Desai AM] because there are concerns - and I think Unmesh will comment on this - around things like radicalisation in prisons, which sits outside your purview, and returning jihadists, which again sits slightly outside.
Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM: I just want to pick up in terms of one of our recommendations in our report, which was around bringing the Prevent programme to London under you and your office because there was a huge disparity between the boroughs, which we did not think made sense, and there was a huge ‘secret squirrel’ agenda around this. We have no idea what is going on, what is working and what is not working. I was wondering what progress you had made with the Home Office on trying to bring some of this under your control.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): I am happy to bring in Sophie [Linden, Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime] in relation to the conversations she has been having with the Home Office. It is not great news but it is progress we are making. Just to remind those who do not know who are watching this, the way it works is that there is money that comes from the Home Office directly to councils for specific projects, which is an issue that you would know well about from your contacts with the community. Sophie has been in discussions with the Home Office and I will let Sophie come in to give you an update on those discussions.
Page 21 Sophie Linden (Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime): I chair the CONTEST Board, which is on pan- London strategic leadership around this, and we have been having discussions with the Home Office. It is not so much discussions around taking the Prevent duty away from local authorities because a lot of this does have to be locally delivered, but we are having discussions about ensuring that we can commission pan-London and we can have a view of what is happening pan-London, of exactly what you are talking about, about what works, what is good practice, how we can make sure that everybody gets up to the standard of the best. We are ongoing with those discussions and we really hope we will be able to come to some agreements around that. Through the CONTEST Board - and actually, one of the recommendations from your report was that we should be more open and accessible - we have been putting the minutes of the meetings onto the website. There are three lots of minutes from January onwards. You will be able to see that we have had discussions around what is happening in each of the local authorities, how that links into the London Prevent Board chaired by the Chief Executive of Waltham Forest, Martin Esom, and what good practice there is. We are having those discussions as well as the negotiations with the Home Office.
Also, in terms of picking up on the prison population and extremism and radicalisation within prisons, whilst we do not have any direct control or levers around that, we have had discussions via the CONTEST Board with the offender management to make sure that everybody around the table understands what is needed and where the gaps are. That is part of the work that we have done through the CONTEST Board. That is pan-London, looking at all the different aspects around prisons, around local authorities and around how we really can prevent radicalisation.
Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM: Have you made any progress with the Home Office in terms of those boroughs that are not getting funding when, actually, they are just the other side of the road within communities and they do not fit in the borough boundaries? Have you made any progress there? That was a huge concern.
Sophie Linden (Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime): That is certainly a discussion that I have had with a number of boroughs and with the Home Office and that officers have been having because that is an issue. As with every issue around policing and crime, it is not a respecter of borough boundaries and people do move between different authorities. It is certainly discussions we are having and negotiations we are having. It is very much on the agenda.
Unmesh Desai AM: I have three or four questions to ask of the Mayor and his Deputy Mayor. Just carrying on, Mr Mayor, speaking very generally, it is important that we do not throw out the baby with the bathwater. Yes, Prevent has been heavily criticised. It does need to be reformed and rethought. I personally believe that any strategy that does not win the hearts and minds of the communities it is aimed at -- and let me rephrase that actually. There is a consensus that radicalisation concerns us all, but you have to win the hearts and minds of the communities that a particular strategy is aimed at specifically.
Having said that it needs to be reformed. Would you agree with me that, so far, the Prevent programme is the only show in town? The Muslim Council of Britain talked two years ago about launching its own version of Prevent. I may be wrong but I have yet to hear from them. It is important that we build on the good points of Prevent and not abandon it completely.
What I am really concerned about is that we do not lose another generation of our young people in particular to the wrong sort of ideology and influences. We have to be courageous here and stick our necks out and sometimes say things that are unpopular. I know over the years you have spoken out on this particular issue. I have. I have been criticised. It is not nice to be accused or whatever language is thrown at one in terms of supporting the general aims of Prevent. However, my question to you is: would you agree that, as things stand right now, the Prevent programme is the only show in town?
Page 22
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Yes. Can I welcome the way you asked your question? As imperfect as Prevent is, what is behind it is something that we should all support. You can tinker and tweak and change things and Caroline [Pidgeon MBE AM] has alluded to some of the challenges and some of the problems with funding and who gets what and who misses out, but the idea is a good one, and I speak as somebody who in Government tried to improve the Prevent programme. There are concerns around wording and about guilt by association and all those sorts of things. None of those issues are insurmountable, by the way.
We have to make sure that we understand that if we do not occupy this space, there is a vacuum and there are people in bedrooms in London being brainwashed, groomed and radicalised through the internet. We need to think about counterpropaganda. We need to think about positive role models. We need to think about a sense of belonging. We need to look at the links with deprivation. We need to give credibility to those whose voices are heard. We need to empower them. All these things need to be done.
My frustration is with the lack of pace in relation to the progress we can make with the Government because at the moment all the stuff that Sophie and the team are doing is, if you like, goodwill because we believe in it and stuff, not because the Government has given us commissioning powers and all the rest of it. You are right that it is the only serious show in town.
Unmesh Desai AM: Just to carry on, Mr Mayor, one of the recommendations of this Committee in the past was that you should commit yourself to exploring new ways of commissioning activity to prevent extremism. I am talking here about the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) funding in particular.
I do not know if you have heard of a group called Minhaj-ul-Quran, which is a worldwide institution. Minhaj-ul-Quran’s headquarters or the main office in London is in Forest Gate in my constituency. I recall a discussion with the General Secretary some three or four years ago and this is what he had to say, “We support the general aims of Prevent. We support the work the police are doing” - and in fact they work with the police in terms of training programmes and so on - “but” - and these words have always stuck in my mind - “until and unless you challenge the ideological foundations of what these people say about Islam, you will never win the battle”. Minhaj does a lot of educational work.
Would you look at ways - and indeed your Deputy [Mayor] - of seeing how MOPAC funding in terms of educational work can be directed or redirected towards groups that seek to promote a positive image of, in this case, Islam but also, more importantly, take on people who put out the wrong interpretation of Islam, as we are talking about in this particular case? A much more proactive educational programme is needed.
As I say, I do agree with this particular individual and the work of Minhaj internationally. The world leader, Dr Qadri, issued a fatwa against al-Qaeda some years ago and has been very outspoken. He has written books in this respect and has spoken all over the world. The Home Office and the police do work with them; certainly in Newham they do. Until and unless we challenge the ideological foundations of the wrong message about Islam - in this case, as I say, we are talking about Islam - terrorism respects no religion and it will be difficult for us to win this battle in the long term.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Sophie [Linden] talked about some of the work that MOPAC are doing in relation to making progress on Prevent with the Home Office and the other work City Hall is doing around social integration and social mobility. Matthew Ryder, the Deputy Mayor [for Social Integration, Social Mobility and Community Engagement], is doing work there.
Page 23 We have to be a bit careful. I am not sure you were saying this, but it would be unfair to characterise the British Muslim community as a community that has not condemned unequivocally the acts of terrorists and also taken on theologically some of the concerns raised. I remember in 2008 as a Minister seeing examples of British Muslim clerics and others taking on the ideology and the jurisprudence relied upon by those preachers of hate. You will be aware that shortly after the London Bridge attack you had a fatwa from British Muslim scholars saying they would not bury those responsible for the terrorist attacks with a Muslim burial because they were ‘outside the fold’.
Look, of course there is more and it would be great if that was amplified and more people knew about that. You will also be aware, of course, of the leader in the Finsbury Park Mosque who stopped the passers-by, frankly speaking, beating to death the terrorists and he reminded them of the Muslim teachings and the work he has been doing there. Look, there is lots of work taking place. If we can use whatever means possible to amplify that good work and to show the minority of individuals who are groomed and brainwashed the other way and what true Islam is, that is a good thing.
Unmesh Desai AM: I would ask you to take note of the work of the Minhaj-ul-Quran. Just moving on, an inquiry was commissioned by David Cameron [former Prime Minister] in December 2015 - this was in response to their then partners in the Coalition Government, the Liberal Democrats - to look at foreign funding of extremist Islamist groups and, in particular, alleged links with Saudi Arabia. This report was due to be published in spring 2016 but the Home Office has since admitted that it may never be released due to sensitive contents.
Do you think the Home Office should publish this report on the foreign funding of such extremist groups and, if so, will you write to the Home Secretary and put all the pressure that you can, using the powers of your office, to ensure this report is published and is in the public domain?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): My problem is that I am not sure if it is sensitive and so --
Unmesh Desai AM: That is what we are told by the Home Office.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Sure --
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): It is a Government-issued report and so you can pressurise them to issue it. The question stands but --
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): The only point I am making, Unmesh, is that there are various theories about why this report has not been published and we know of the concerns people have about contracts with some of the countries that are involved. What I will say is that it is quite clear that there is now evidence of interference from other countries in relation to radicalisation, but I do not know enough about the report and the concerns the Government has around sensitivities and stuff.
Unmesh Desai AM: Perhaps you could look into it. Earlier this year both The Rt Hon Jeremy Corbyn MP [Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Labour Party] and Tim Farron MP [former Leader of the Liberal Democrats] called on the Government to publish its report, which allegedly focused on the role of Saudi Arabia in particular. However, as I say - and I appreciate that you do not have direct powers but certainly the powers of your office - add your weight to that of the two leaders, Tim Farron MP and The Rt Hon Jeremy Corbyn MP, and see what you can do. I will leave it at that, Chairman.
Page 24 Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Thank you. Just to finalise on this before we move on, the Committee recognises the strength of the of the response but also the importance of the prevention and Prevent and the fact that actually at the moment we have not got to where we want to be, based on the earlier Committee reports around working with the Home Office and leading in that manner. We will return to that at a later date.
You mentioned Matthew Ryder, Deputy Mayor [for Social Integration, Social Mobility and Community Engagement], and again I am impressed by the work that he is doing. I know he is drawing up a plan and a funding budget that is actually about integration and some of the things we are talking about. That is reassuring.
Talking about reports, I had frustrations around the Casey report [Dame Louise Casey, The Casey Review into Opportunity and Integration, 2016] because that was commissioned and then appeared to get buried and so I do not quite know where that particularly went.
Now I want to move on, if I may, to the Grenfell [Tower fire]. Clearly, the MPS has now opened a criminal investigation into the fire but, really, we want some questions towards the Mayor around this.
Andrew Dismore AM: Before we go on, I just have one question on counterterrorism and that is this.
We have looked at response after the event. We have looked at ‘Prevent’ with a capital P. It is a resource issue. It is ‘prevent’ with a small P. It is the gathering of intelligence. The gathering of intelligence, as we have heard from Craig Mackay [QPM, Deputy Commissioner, MPS] time and time again, starts at the community level. If we do not have the community officers on the beat, we do not get that intelligence coming through.
Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM: Exactly.
Andrew Dismore AM: You cannot say whether any of the recent incidents could have been prevented if we had had more police officers in the communities gathering intelligence that way, but is that really where the resource issue bites into counterterrorism?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Absolutely. One of the reasons why we were so keen to increase the number of dedicated ward officers (DWOs), if you like the bobbies on the beat, was to build up that trust and conference between Londoners and the police. That is what policing by consent is all about. If you speak to any police expert, they will tell you about the importance of that policing. That is why we have been saying this for the last 16 months. I know some people do not like it, but we need more resources. I know some people are embarrassed by it, but we need more resources. I will not stop saying that until we get the resources we need.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): We will get onto frontline policing in some other questions.
Andrew Dismore AM: Yes, but I thought it was important to put that point --
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Yes, all right.
Andrew Dismore AM: -- because it is the third strand of this issue which has not been covered.
Page 25 Going on to the Grenfell [Tower fire], Mr Mayor, you have raised the question of trust and confidence in the police. One of the issues that has arisen around the incident has been the question of trust and confidence in the police inquiry. How are you trying to ensure that that trust and confidence of the community is built? There was a lot of suspicion at the beginning, rightly or wrongly, about what had been going on, about the number of fatalities and so forth, and all sorts of hares were set running and some people were making rather unfortunate political capital at what has been going on. How are you trying to maintain and build the trust and confidence of the community? How are you going to try to ensure that the Inquiry is thorough and transparent?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Firstly, can I thank you for the advice you have given my office in relation to Inquiries from your previous experience.
Look, when I have been attending the area - Notting Hill, North Kensington - over the last few weeks, what is clear to me in relation to what the residents want is that they want to know what happened in relation to Grenfell Tower in the real sense of the word. They want justice to be done and for those responsible for the lead-up to and what we saw in Grenfell Tower to have justice done and that means criminal prosecutions and I will come to that in a second. Thirdly, they want lessons learned so that it never happens again.
What has happened over the course of the last few weeks and months is a breakdown of trust and confidence between the local community and those in positions of power and influence and I mean that in the loosest sense of the term. People in positions of power and influence in the eyes of the community have let that community down for years. A public inquiry can be a useful vehicle to get to the bottom of what happened, bearing in mind, as you will be aware, that they cannot decide upon civil or criminal liability but the facts are uncovered. We saw it with Hillsborough; we saw with other public inquiries how useful they have been as a vehicle.
The concern the police have - and I will let Martin [Hewitt] refer to it later on - is that sometimes for the best of intentions, in relation to trying to get to the bottom of the truth with a public Inquiry, you can inadvertently cause problems with a criminal prosecution in relation to sub judice, witnesses being cross-questioned and all the other issues that I will let Martin allude to. What I do know has been happening between Martin, the Commissioner [of Police of the Metropolis] and the Chair of the public Inquiry is making sure that good intentions do not lead to an outcome nobody wants, which is - God forbid - a prosecution not being able to take place because of the public Inquiry. It is difficult conversation they have had and I will let Martin respond.
I will say this, though, before I let Martin respond. The reality, is that the public Inquiry terms of reference are not what the public want. They are not what the residents want. There are real concerns with the terms of reference. I have been saying to the Government that if the public Inquiry is not the right vehicle, look into the whole issue of social housing and I have suggested a social housing commissioner to look at the wider issues of the years of neglect that led to the situation in the Grenfell Tower. If we are not careful, we could have the worst of all worlds in relation to not knowing the full facts, not learning the right lessons and justice not being done.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Actually, there is to quite a strong degree - amongst the residents, amongst the survivors, amongst those who lost people in the fire - a level of confidence in the criminal investigation. We were there on the night in responding and the investigation began literally that next morning. I have had overall responsibility for that since then.
We have had an investigation that has run in a number of strands, which is worth just explaining. Clearly, there was the immediate response to the fire on the night. We then have had the operation that is going on at the
Page 26 tower with what we would call disaster victim identification, which is the incredibly difficult and important role of being able to repatriate all the remains of people that are in that building and bring them out in a dignified way and in a way that allows us, as best we can, to identify those remains and then return them to their families. That has been an extraordinary process, an unprecedented process that we have undertaken at the tower and we are still in the process of undertaking. We should probably have concluded that phase by the end of October.
It is painstaking, as you might imagine, and I am not in this forum going to go into some of the detail of the intensity of what happened there, but it is very distressing and it is a very challenging role for people to undertake, working really closely with the Coroner, Dr Wilcox, and the extraordinary operation that she has created at the Westminster Coroner’s Court there. As of yesterday, which was made public, we have positively identified 60 people, which is really positive for those families. We will continue to work through in relation to that.
One of the very first things that we do in any major investigation - and it is important to point out that outside a counterterrorism event, this is probably the largest and most complex investigation we have ever undertaken, an investigation into what is the deaths of probably somewhere between 75 and 80 people - we deploy Family Liaison Officers (FLOs). We have deployed more FLOs than in my experience I have ever known to all the families of those people who potentially have lost somebody in in the building or who were in the building themselves. Those FLOs have developed an extraordinary relationship with the residents. Then we have a broader community engagement process that we kicked off on the day after with the communities in and around, which you know very well and there are communities that are equally impacted.
We have the objective of identifying if there are individuals or corporations or organisations that are responsible for that fire. We are conducting a criminal investigation, which means that we have to produce our evidence to the criminal standard of proof to get us to a point where we are able to present that to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) if a prosecution is appropriate.
One of the unique things - it is probably fair to go as far as ‘unique’ in my experience – is, in many cases when you start a big complex investigation you might not know at that stage who the suspects or suspect organisations are and that is definitely true here. Equally, in this case we do not even know yet what the offences might be because there are a range of offences that could be in play here. From ones that we have been very public about, the potential for corporate manslaughter or manslaughter by gross negligence in the case of individuals and there will be an entire range of regulatory offences around building regulations, fire regulations and a whole host of others.
We are starting from a situation where what we are looking at in primary terms is the original construction of the building, the refurbishment of the building, the management of the building and then the response by all agencies on the night. That is the core of our investigation. We have identified over 2,500 witnesses at this stage and we have taken initial witness accounts from about 1,000 people. In those four stages that I talked about in terms of organisations and institutions, there are over 330 organisations, companies and corporate bodies who have had some role in each of those stages. We are working through enormous amounts of documentary evidence. That is going to take us time.
Fundamentally, what sits at the centre of all of that is a very large and complex fire investigation and so we have the Building Research Establishment (BRE), which is conducting that with our forensic people, and they are going through that process because there is plenty out there in the media about what may or may not have caused that fire to behave in the completely unprecedented way that it behaved. I guess where we get to at the end will be a combination of a number of factors that have come together at that point to do that. That is
Page 27 a painstaking process that we have to go through and, as I say, the really important point is that when we get to the end of that process, it has to be sufficiently robust that it meets the criminal standard of proof and it goes into a criminal trial, potentially, which is an adversarial process where, clearly, those we are accusing will be defending themselves. Therefore, it has to be done in a very methodical fashion.
We started the investigation the day after. I have in the pure investigation and family liaison about 180 officers working on this and on top of that are all the officers on a daily basis, the Disaster Victim Identification Officers and the search officers who are in the building itself. It is an extraordinary investigation.
We have had senior CPS lawyers working alongside us from the outset. In fact, the lawyer that we have is the lawyer who worked on the Lakanal House investigation in Southwark and so has real context in relation to that.
We are continually updating the families and all those affected, either individually through FLOs, individually through the senior investigating officers with those who have lost people, in group meetings - we had a meeting at the beginning of this week - and through a whole range of communication mechanisms to make sure that all those who are affected understand what we are doing and understand how we are doing it. It is absolutely clear to me, as the Mayor has said, that the overriding imperative that comes from those family members is that they want people to be held accountable, those people who should be held accountable for what caused that fire and ultimately caused those deaths.
That is the role that our criminal investigation will undertake. I have met personally twice with the judge and the Chair of the Inquiry and his senior team because there is a tension between a public inquiry where, quite properly, his objective is to put all the information that he gets out into the public domain, as you would expect, and our requirement to protect and manage evidence as we go forward. It is really complex because, in one sense, they could say, “Just tell us the bits that are not going to be significant and that is OK”, but, as I said at the very beginning, we do not know what is going to be significant as we work our way through over 30 million documents and interview all sorts of people. As you would understand, in any complicated investigation, we would have a very phased process as to when we interview people and how we interview people and how evidence and information is disclosed to those people as we go forward. Therefore, we are working very closely with the team. We recently had his senior lawyers come out and visit the site and go through the site and understand the work that we are doing there. They visited the major incident room to understand the scale and the nature of how we investigate a serious crime. They have also sat with our forensic people to look at the process that we are undertaking with the BRE. We will continue to work forward.
I have absolutely no desire to frustrate the aims of the public Inquiry - of course I do not - and, clearly, there is a legal requirement on me to share everything with the public Inquiry, but where I need to hold the line is in terms of protecting the integrity of our criminal investigation. Those individuals who have been directly or indirectly affected understand what we are doing. It is confusing for the general public when you have an investigation over here and you have an inquiry over there. How does that fit together? We are doing our best to communicate clearly and doing our best to work with the inquiry to communicate that because there are lots of things that the Inquiry will be able to speak about very quickly and needs to speak about.
Just to be very clear, in the very first Prime Minister-chaired meeting that I was at and the Mayor was at, we made it very clear that if we uncover any bit of evidence that has a broader public safety implication, then we will share that immediately. We have worked really closely with the Department for Communities and Local Government in relation to that. We are in a better place.
Page 28 You alluded to a lot of the speculation that took place in the immediate aftermath of the fire about the number of people who may or may not have been killed, which was very unhelpful and, quite frankly, most importantly, very distressing for people who were affected by that fire. We had some very uncomfortable meetings with family members because I will only work on facts. I am not going to speculate to make a meeting easier or to make people feel better. We have had to stick to the facts.
I am confident that by the enormous process that we have done of basically deconflicting all the information that has come down, it takes us to a point where we now have a definitive number of people that we believe are reported as missing and we have not managed to find them. As was mentioned yesterday in the media, we now have the definitive position on the closed-circuit television footage of all the people that we saw leaving in the immediate aftermath of the fire. It is about 250-odd that we have positively identified. We now, tragically, have 60 people’s lives that we have identified as having been lost in the fire and there will be more than that.
There is confidence in that community. There is frustration and anger and hurt, but there is confidence. We are doing what we always do, which is just being very honest and the FLOs are being very honest with people. We at senior level are putting ourselves in front of those groups. There is oversight. When the Mayor meets with the Commissioner [of Police of the Metropolis] and when the Deputy Mayor [for Policing and Crime] meets with me, this is an area that is constantly raised because, as I say, it is unparalleled in terms of an investigation of its kind.
Andrew Dismore AM: Thank you for that pretty comprehensive update. I have a few follow-up questions.
I assume from what you say that there have been no interviews under caution so far, but can you give a rough estimate of when you think you are going to be in that position? I remember when we asked Craig Mackey [QPM, Deputy Commissioner, MPS] this soon after the event, he thought that you would be in a position to make that sort of progress in the autumn. Has that timetable drifted?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): It is one of those situations where you are uncovering more as you as you go through, clearly, and I am loath to speculate. We are moving through fast. As I said, we have taken 1,000 witness interviews. The challenge we have here is that we start with this and we are having to work our way down to get to the points which get to the very core issues around what we think caused the fire to behave in the way that it behaved. Clearly, we are having to be driven by the timescales of the fire, but the fire investigation fundamentally is what is going to come at the end and say, “It is a combination of these factors in this priority that caused the fire to behave in the unexpected way that it did”. Therefore, that is a really key point and so we would not be rushing to interview under caution.
What I would say is that that is not in any way a suggestion that this is not moving at pace. It is not in any way a suggestion that we are not thinking in those terms, but we have to do that at the right point. It will still be some months probably before we are in a position to start to identify that, but, as you would imagine, there is a real determination. I pressure them when I have my oversight to start coning ourselves down to getting to the real core point. The other important point about doing that is that those things that we are satisfied become peripheral - and there will be some that we can - are ones that can be left with the public Inquiry to take a lead role. It is an iterative process and I do not want to give a timeline that does not turn out to be correct, to be frank.
Andrew Dismore AM: That then comes to the next question, which is about resources. You have had to pull in a lot of resources from across the MPS and some little specialist units like the Antiques and Arts Team have effectively ceased to operate while you use their offices --
Page 29
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Not quite true, but yes.
Andrew Dismore AM: -- to do this sort of work. You have had to pull in people from across London. Nobody would object to that; that is the right thing to do. Question one is: do you have sufficient resources for what you need to do?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Yes.
Andrew Dismore AM: Question two is: what has been the impact of bringing all those people in on policing across London to do this sort of work? For example, we know there has been a detective shortage. Has that added to these sorts of problems?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Yes, it has, inevitably, because a lot of the people who are involved in the investigation are clearly detectives. A lot of the FLOs will be uniformed constables and so it has less of an impact.
The process we go through is pretty similar to the process that I described in answer to the question from Mr Duvall [AM] about how we make sure we are not pulling people away. The team have repeatedly had to come back to me with, “Here is the scale of what we need and here are the particular skills that we need”. That is a process that we continually go through.
Of course, an investigation will have phases. We are in a phase at the moment where we need to get ourselves through those initial accounts from people. We need to do that quickly in some cases. We are obviously having to manage the emotional and psychological state of some of those people that we want to speak to. Again, that is another really important point around coordinating with the public inquiry because what we do not want is someone who is traumatised, as everyone will be, being talked to by us and then talked to by the inquiry. We are working closely in how we manage that. We need a large number of people to get us through this initial stage and then that will be repeatedly refined. Then, of course, if you get to a stage later on, potentially, with prosecutions, then you may need to bring more expertise or particular skills in. It is constantly reviewed.
Of course, that is having a direct impact on the place where those people were working the day before I pulled them in and pulled them onto this team. That is just a reality in terms of how we are having to manage our resources. I am sure in later areas we will come on to the whole resourcing issue but Grenfell is clearly part of what I think is a fairly unprecedented demand situation that we are in at the moment. From my perspective and certainly from the Commissioner’s perspective it is an investigation the like of which we have not seen and we have to get this investigation right. Therefore, we have to put the resources in that we require.
Andrew Dismore AM: To summarise - I do not want to put words in your mouth - effectively you have the resources you need. If you need more, you ask for more and you get more but that does have a knock-on impact on policing across the capital.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Of course it does, yes.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Thank you for that comprehensive response. We have in a month’s time, I believe, the Commissioner and yourself here, Deputy Mayor, and so we can get a further update at that time. I am conscious we have the Mayor for significantly less than an hour so I would like it if, for the remaining time, we can direct our questions very much towards the Mayor while we have him here.
Page 30
We are going to move on to challenges to frontline policing now. Within that we are talking about the background of rising crime and rising demand, particularly around knife crime. We touch upon mergers and the engagement process.
Sian Berry AM (Deputy Chair): I would like to ask about the development of what has been promised in terms of a knife crime prevention campaign particularly aimed at younger people, what progress you have made with that and what is coming up. We are expecting an update quite soon.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Thanks, Sian. We are, this autumn. From now, you will see four big things happening. In September and October, allocation of knife wands to schools and Safer Schools officers, because of summer holidays. It could not happen then obviously. We have in October the Education Knife Crime Summit. It is really important to get not just the MPS but those who will be involved in the consultation in that. In late autumn, we will get what you are alluding to, which is the media prevention campaign and materials. With the best will in the world, Sophie [Linden] and I are not the right people to carry the message.
Sian Berry AM (Deputy Chair): No, nor me.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): As much as we would like to think we have the street cred, we do not. What we are doing is this, Sian. We have recently gone out to tender for the development of a media campaign targeted towards young people and their parents, raising awareness of the dangers and consequences of knife crime and the reassurance role. The commitment Sophie [Linden] made to Caroline [Pidgeon MBE AM] at the last meeting was to let you see some of that stuff and that commitment is still there, for obvious reasons.
Then in January, Sian, the last part of the autumn equation is that we will start the community seed funding stuff that I know a number of colleagues are interested in. The seed funding is £250,000 to community groups and anti-knife initiatives in priority areas for 2017/18 and we are working with community groups and experts about what the funding model should be. The bad news is it will not be a replacement for the youth services cut, which I know you have campaigned on in the past. It will be to help communities do some of that, empower them to do some of the prevention work.
Sian Berry AM (Deputy Chair): That is useful. Just a couple of questions to follow up on that. You said, “In January you will see the community seed funding”. That will be an announcement of a process to bid, will it? That is what is happening in January?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Yes. We are currently talking to community groups and anti-knife crime initiatives about what the funding model should be and we will announce that in January.
Sian Berry AM (Deputy Chair): The other thing that I have seen recently was that in August the Home Office Minister said that there was going to be a Home Office campaign on knife crime that was described as ‘hard-hitting’. I wondered if you had talked to the Home Office about that. I know we have our concerns in the Committee about the value of hard-hitting campaigns as opposed to more engaging ones.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Do you want to talk about that?
Sophie Linden (Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime): We are absolutely aware of the Home Office announcement on the campaign and also on a type of community seed funding such as ours, and we are discussing with them at the moment how we might be able to align together for both those things. Those are
Page 31 discussions we are having with the Home Office because it would be difficult to have two very different messages going out and we all want the same thing. We are talking to them.
Sian Berry AM (Deputy Chair): That is really useful. Maybe you could share the funding between them to make it more effective.
Sophie Linden (Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime): Yes. We will see where discussions get to but, yes, we are absolutely aware of that.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): You will be aware, Sian, that our process for the Knife Crime Strategy involves a lot of consultation and lots of work. We believe in our Strategy. What we do not want to do is, for the interests of chasing money, move away from our Strategy. That is why Sophie is in delicate conversations with the Home Office about that.
Sian Berry AM (Deputy Chair): That is useful to know. Are you any closer to making some guidelines for forces on social media? I continually see images of very large knives still being posted by local forces on Twitter and we know that is something that will increase fear. I know there is a goal there of reassurance, “We have captured some big knives”, but my view is that you could do that in words rather than images and we have asked for guidance before.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): If I am honest, it is one that I am quite conflicted about as well. We had the discussion relatively recently when I had all the Borough Commanders together. There is a requirement for us to be demonstrating the activity that we are doing, particularly around taking knives off the street and particularly around the kind of knife sweeps we do to take knives, where people will hide them in communal spaces. Sometimes there is a benefit to be able to do that. The downside of doing it is the one that you identify, which is that it can be quite alarming, particularly with some of the weapons. It is hard to come out with one policy that fits all circumstances, fits all places and fits the context at any given point in time in different places. I know that they are all considering it and giving it real thought before they do it.
You are right that it could create a real concern. It is equally the dilemma, that if I talk about all the activity that we have done under Operation Sceptre over the summer or over the last four or five months, on the one hand I want to be saying to you the number of knives that we have taken off the street but the converse of that is that can be quite alarming when people realise that there are that number, or the number of guns or whatever. We are always in that dilemma. There are appropriate times to do it but we are conscious that if it is done in the wrong way or if it is done too frequently it can cause alarm rather than reassuring people about what we are doing.
Sian Berry AM (Deputy Chair): I will continue to talk to you about that. The final thing: yesterday at the meeting in Camden with the Joint Commander for Camden and Islington, she said that the merger between the two boroughs had freed up officers who had now been assigned as Safer Schools Officers and Youth Engagement Officers. Is there an uplift planned as a result of other savings in these kinds of offices or is that just a side-effect that happened in Camden and Islington?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): No, that was precisely one of the reasons for the concept of the mergers. It gives you a greater mass of people together, who you can then allocate in a slightly different way. One of the areas that we wanted to increase was the DWOs to fulfil the Mayor’s commitment and potentially greater numbers, and the other one was schools officers. We want to double, if we can, the number of officers that work in schools. It fits into a whole range of preventative activities, quite frankly, not just about violence but also about drugs, sexual behaviour and radicalisation. Certainly, one of the best
Page 32 programmes we have had in terms of schools engagement has been in Islington. It has been pushed by [Detective Chief Superintendent] Catherine Roper, who also has the lead from me around youth engagement among the Borough Commanders. It is something we are committed to do and it is one of the outcomes we want to deliver through the mergers.
Sian Berry AM (Deputy Chair): Thank you.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): We are going to have some very pointed questions toward the Mayor about borough mergers in a minute, particularly on knife crime. Last night in Croydon town centre there was a very serious stabbing incident, fortunately not fatal.
Len Duvall AM: Mr Mayor, you need to be congratulated because in your Violent Crime Strategy, for the first time, we have a recognition about violence and the nature of its impact on our communities. It has taken us a long time to get there, in terms of the questioning around this table to the police. I think most police officers recognise that and of course it comes in many strands. I have to commend some of the work because this week in Lewisham we are going through knife sweep areas in all the wards, working with the communities in an open way and confronting some of the issues of where these weapons are stashed and not allowing people to evade, so congratulations on that. However, it is one of many strands. There is an issue about whether in the MPS we need a Violent Crime Strategy. Whether we are successful in getting any extra resources, it is about prioritising risk.
Recently we had a conversation at Mayor’s Question Time (MQT) about domestic violence and about the suggestion I made, saying that it is not the silver bullet but one way we could protect survivors from repeats, and also their siblings. There is an interesting report out about the abuse register. The MPS is carrying out an operation called Operation Dauntless Plus which is about monitoring some of these offenders and I wondered whether you could share with us - I know you have not been given notice of this question - where we are on that. Is it ongoing? Is it coming to an end? When is your assessment? The Mayor is about to convene his Domestic Violence Forum. Can you give us a flavour of where you are at?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Yes. Operation Dauntless was set up across all the boroughs to deal with domestic abuse offenders because it is one thing when offenders are dealt with and they are there at the time when the incident occurs, but others are wanted subsequently. In response to wanting to improve the level of how we were going and getting the cases together and arresting those people, Dauntless was set up. That is in operation around the boroughs, sitting within the Community Safety Units, who will have a team. In various places, we are trialling other activities that get us to not only arresting offenders but also various opportunities around trying to stop offenders behaving in the way they are because, as we all know, you end up in that cycle of continual offending, arrest and reoffending going forward. There are a whole range of ways in which we are approaching that. For me, as you say, that is at one end of a spectrum of violent behaviour that we need to deal with. Dauntless is still going on and still operates in boroughs.
Len Duvall AM: Mr Mayor and Deputy Mayor, I have written to the Commissioner asking for their views about whether an abusers register would help in prioritising risk of those who are - predominantly, not always - men of violence, in those circumstances. Is some of the work that the MPS doing looking at Criminal Behaviour Orders (CBOs) and am I right in thinking that work is rather cumbersome and bureaucratic but could give the same protection to survivors of domestic violence and their siblings, in terms of restrictions? Is that one of the areas you were alluding to? Have you come to a conclusion that you require a change in how those orders work? because they are time-consuming, and we would not get consistency across the MPS because of the time it takes to put into practice?
Page 33 Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): There are a range of orders that have been put in place around a number of these kinds of areas and some of them are potentially quite challenging to work your way through. Equally, I would say - this is a theme that we have had in a number of my meetings when I get all the Borough Commanders together - that we have not been good enough at using those orders. I do not think they need a radical change. There are lots of provisions that have been put in place to allow you to better control dangerous behaviour and we need to work better at getting our people to use them.
Len Duvall AM: That is quite interesting because my research led me to the view that it was not just about the abuser’s risk, but a number of issues around domestic violence, and talking to people on the ground they welcomed use of that but just thought it was too cumbersome. There have only been, to be fair, one done in the MPS at the moment. I think that is about how useful the tool is; you think there is a smarter way of working.
You said earlier on in relation to counterterrorism, I think, about digital issues. One of the issues that comes back to us, as I have alluded to in the letter to Cressida [Dick QPM, Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis], is the use of downloading from phones. If I am a witness and you want what I have, you cannot tell me when you will give it back. You say that it could be up to three weeks, as a potential witness, that I do not have my phone. If I am a survivor of abuse that could be my only network out. It is either because we do not have people trained in doing it, or there is only one machine inside the central hub and that is in use. We are losing out on that. We are losing a chance to bring people to justice through that evidence or corroborating what is going on. There are some practical issues. Do you want to comment on that? It seems to me there is an issue for wider policing, not just in counterterrorism, about some of that digital capture and the nature of that.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): No, that is absolutely a challenge that we face. I said, in answer to the earlier question, it is not just in counterterrorism. In almost all offences there is a digital footprint of some description. We are increasing the awareness and understanding of officers about what to do and how to do it. As you rightly point out, there is only the one centre at the moment but we have a plan to increase the number of centres around London where you can actually do the downloading. It is a constant theme in many offences but particularly in offences of violence and sexual offences where you have a survivor. For most people, our lives are run on one of those devices. Losing that for an extended period of time is one of the issues that, I think, leads toward attrition. We are working through it. This is not an MPS problem, this is a national problem about how you deal with what we would describe as ‘digital investigation’. It is increasingly the predominant element of evidence within a lot of offending.
Sophie Linden (Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime): Can I also just pick up on some of those issues that you have raised? We are - I think I talked about this last time I was in front of the Police and Crime Committee - in the process of refreshing the Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy. There is one today that I am going to on perpetrators. We are really looking at every little bit in terms of enforcement and in terms of support for survivors and victims as well. We are working through these issues around CBOs in terms of enforcement action, why they are not being taken enough by the MPS and what the barriers are. I have recently signed off investment decisions where we are putting much better capacity into local police to download digital evidence that can be shared with the CPS and with the courts in a much quicker time. We are investing in that because it is so important.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): I think the Commissioner --
Len Duvall AM: We will be looking for a fast track on the procurement issues, to move on those issues, because it will give us a greater impact.
Page 34 Sophie Linden (Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime): Yes. We are procuring at the moment.
Len Duvall AM: Mr Mayor, we are not in the business of making work for the police. The abuse register is not about that. It is a recognition that police are stretched and that sometimes you have to make priorities and make those decisions, in terms of the risk that the community faces, about individuals. You indicated initially at the Assembly Mayor’s Question Time meeting that you were quite interested in trying to take that forward. We now have all-party support on this in the Assembly. We are going to step up some of our conversations in national debates. Will you now put some resources into looking at the abuse register and some of the allied things that I have said? We will be in communication with the MPS. Like I say, we do not want to create extra work. We want to help. It is an aid and a tool to keep people safe, both the survivors and siblings in their community, and it gives the police a chance to prioritise that risk because they go under sexual offences.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Can I move this on? Shortly, if you can, please.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Chairman, at MQT I said that it is an idea worth exploring. One of the things that Sophie [Linden] and Claire [Waxman, Victims Commissioner] will do when it comes to meeting the victims, the community groups, is sound them out, Len, because what I do not want to do is impose something that may not be welcomed by the community groups and the victims. Subject to Sophie and Claire speaking to the various groups, let us come back to that.
Len Duvall AM: Thank you.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Good. Let us move back to the agenda on frontline policing particularly. I want these last questions, if we may, directed to the Mayor while we have him, which would be great. This is particularly around the merger pathfinders.
Susan Hall AM: Mr Mayor, you have said that borough merger pathfinders are not delivering as intended. What are the problems that you have identified?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): In terms of emergency response, clearly some of the initial findings in the east and north in the two pathfinders were unwelcome. There are four separate things that we were hoping the borough mergers would lead to. Sorry, five. One is to save money, so five things. Saving money is very important. Second is the neighbourhood response that AC Hewitt referred to in relation to Safer Schools Officers and the additional DWO. The response from the neighbourhood response is very important.
The third thing is an area that is unacceptable is emergency response. In the two pathfinders we have east worst than the north where the emergency response has not been good enough. You will be aware that, roughly speaking, the MPS expects 90% of calls to be responded to within 50 minutes, the immediate response, and it has not been good enough in the east and the north with the pathfinders. The police operationally are doing stuff to address the issue of emergency response.
The fourth issue is investigation. Having more detectives doing the complex crime is really important. Assembly Member Dismore referred to the shortage of detectives. A big issue is making sure we can have detectives doing the complex crime stuff.
The last issue is one that has been referred to by Len Duvall [AM] just now, an issue of safeguarding. We need to be much, much better at domestic abuse, mental health and missing persons, and one of the things that I found most troubling about the Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) report last year was their
Page 35 conclusion that as a consequence of perverse incentives around the MOPAC 7, vulnerable people were missing out and losing out. If we can bring together that sort of safeguarding issue, it can lead to improvements.
In relation to neighbourhood investigation and safeguarding there has been good progress seen in the two pathfinders. I am afraid in relation to emergency response it has been unacceptable.
Susan Hall AM: You are mainly concerned about response times?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): You mean the concerns with the pathfinders?
Susan Hall AM: Yes.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Yes, that has been the biggest issue and I agree with the concerns raised.
Susan Hall AM: What are you going to do about that?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): As I answered at MQT, in relation to the northwest, Camden and Islington, there has been an improvement. It is almost at target rates, between 80% and 90%. We have seen that as a consequence of the changes in relation to improvements there. In relation to the east there are still some concerns around emergency response. Again, the local commanders are putting in more resources. Some of it has led to moving from neighbourhood to response but we thought it was worth it. We are seeing an improvement in emergency response. It is still not where it needs to be, though.
Susan Hall AM: If it is not where it needs to be, what are you going to do to address that?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): The Borough Commanders are taking steps to resolve that. Martin, do you want to come in?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Can I? Particularly in terms of response on both, we put in a programme of activity that kicked off particularly at the beginning of September. The reason it was delayed until September was because there were some information technology (IT) changes that we needed to make. Just in terms of the last week, the week that ended last Friday, the central north was up to 87% response in the emergency calls, which would put it very much on a par with other boroughs across the organisation. On the east it was up to 73%, which is a marked improvement from where it was but still not where we want to get it to. My expectation will be that certainly in three or four weeks’ time from now we should have both of them operating at a level that is similar to the levels of all the other boroughs.
There is a point that needs bearing particularly around the east one. Our most pressured area in London is northeast London as a whole and all the boroughs in northeast London are facing very significant demand pressures. It is a combination of that, and then the pathfinder site being put into place and some of the learning that we have had from what we did in that pathfinder.
We are making significant improvements. The pressure is maintained from me in terms of maintaining those improvements and it is certainly maintained by Sophie [Linden], who holds me to account on a fortnightly basis on where we are with the pathfinder sites. All of this would feed into the evaluation that will take place towards the end of the year.
Susan Hall AM: We will throw all that into consideration when we are looking at closing front counters and actual stations where we get response from?
Page 36
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): They are separate things.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): They are separate issues. One is the consultation around front counters. One is the two pathfinders and borough mergers.
Susan Hall AM: Yes, but if you are removing some stations where you have response teams, will that not make a difference?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): The consultation is around front counters.
Susan Hall AM: I know, and you are looking at closing some. They are attached to stations that might close.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): As you would imagine, the modelling that we have done around where we would retain buildings and where we would retain patrol sites, as we would call them -- because often the response times are not at a police station that is open to the public, they are in --
Susan Hall AM: No, but sometimes they are.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Sometimes they are but the planning that we have, clearly, is to allow us to have the required coverage of officers across any particular geographic area. Officers do not stay in a police station and wait to respond to calls. The response teams are pretty much out all of the time. Another part of the change programme is providing all the officers with mobility so they do not need to come back to the police station. Their devices will allow them to do all of the responsibilities and jobs they can do. In a sense, the patrol base is where you go, you get briefed and you pick up your car and your equipment. Then they are patrolling. It is not a fire service kind of model of being in the fire station.
Susan Hall AM: No, but sometimes they are attached to.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Yes, they would be attached to, but we have modelled the estates programme so that we are satisfied that we have patrol bases, bases where response teams are, that are located to allow us to have coverage across the geography.
Susan Hall AM: That will not change. That is good. Thank you.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): I agree that one of the big concerns, particularly for the outer London boroughs, is the geographical size. The worry early on and the worry now, in fact, is the response issue. The concern was big geographical boroughs, Bromley, Croydon --
Unmesh Desai: Barking and Dagenham.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): And elsewhere, of course. Hearing about the problems in the east, it does need fixing before you can get that reassurance around it.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Yes. The concern you are expressing is a fair one and one that MOPAC and the MPS need to take on board when it comes to borough mergers, but also reconfiguring front counters and stuff. Just to reassure you, before the consultation began one of the things the MPS did, working with MOPAC, was to make sure that where officers are and where the machinery, the cars and stuff, is taken into consideration. Often the front counters and the police officers are not in the same place, necessarily speaking.
Page 37
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): We will get on to front counters. I am hearing that possibly in those larger geographical areas you might revert back to a semi-borough structure. I will let that be because Andrew wants to come in.
Andrew Dismore AM: Yes. First of all, Sadiq, I am very pleased that last week you promised that you would publish and write to me with the objective criteria that are going to be applied to evaluate this and that there will be no roll-out until the problems have been resolved. Those are two very important commitments.
It is not just a question of response times. There have been lots of other problems as well, for example community engagement and so forth. If we look at response times first, I am very pleased if in one week we have been able to sort things out but looking at the figures I have for Camden as part of the Borough Command Unit (BCU), up until the change Camden was performing at or better than the MPS average and ever since the change it has been significantly worse, apart from possibly one week. From the briefing we had yesterday, I understand that one of the ways you have tried to resolve that is to go back to borough mobilisation, which is where we started. Is that not undermining what you are trying to achieve through this?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): No, I do not think it is undermining. When we said that we wanted to do these pathfinders to learn and to test our model there was quite a lot of scepticism from people, but what has actually happened is, we have learnt and we are changing things as a result of that. It has been different in a model where you have a model that has two boroughs brought together and two that are very geographically tight. We have had different learning in a place where you are bringing three boroughs together and with all sorts of other geographic issues. We are not going to carry on with a situation where the response times were not acceptable, and that is not because our model is not working, that is because it is not right for the public. Quite rightly, Sophie was not prepared to accept that either. We have made a change to allow us to understand how we can make that work. It is not a reversal and that is never going to change, but it was needed to get us to a place where we can let other parts of the model stabilise itself. Then we can look at how you can perhaps take that forward. It is about the service we are providing to the public. We could not stay with the response that we had.
Andrew Dismore AM: We have not been given the response calls for S [significant priority] calls. We were given a chart yesterday in this briefing about progress on the mergers.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Yes.
Andrew Dismore AM: Could we have a similar chart to Appendix A for the S calls as well, showing where we have got to with that? That is not quite as important as I [immediate priority] calls but still pretty important.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): It is important.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): For those not experts, that is “significant” priority versus “immediate”.
Andrew Dismore AM: Yes. Going on with this, you mentioned a point about the three boroughs. Representing Barnet, the issue for us has been that Barnet and Harrow we are prepared to live with, but with Barnet, Harrow and Brent we are worried that we are going to end up in the same sort of mess. Will part of the evaluation be looking at the configuration that was originally intended to see if in fact three boroughs are too many, like we have potentially found in the eastern one, and whether we need to look at a different configuration?
Page 38 Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): I deliberately set out when I answered a question from Susan Hall that there are five big things we are looking at, and one of them is to save money. I am not going to pretend that one of the motivations around borough mergers and BCUs is not to save money, which is why we are talking about going down to 12. Twelve is the number that the Commissioner and Sophie [Linden], have advised, would be the one to try to make these savings we need, subject to the service to the public that AC Hewitt referred to. There is a separate discussion then, about what goes into configuring the 12, but before we get to that we need to evaluate the first two pathfinders. If we are doing it in steps it might be a better way of doing it, but I take your point around the concerns of two smaller boroughs being linked with Brent for the reasons you alluded to.
Andrew Dismore AM: That is another way of doing it, evaluating it, but what I am saying, I suppose, is if the option of relooking at the proposed configuration is not finalised; we can still look at that again, depending on the evaluation.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): That is a fair conclusion. Yes.
Andrew Dismore AM: Then the next question is, if in the end this cannot be made to work, is there a plan B? If so, what is it?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): The plan B is to find other ways to save money. The long and short of it is I have a budget of this size. Roughly speaking, 75% comes from central Government and 25% comes from the precept. Last year I made the decision to increase the precept. I could well decide to do it again this year, bearing in mind how tight money is. You do not need to have a crystal ball to predict I probably will do that. Even if I did that, there is still a massive, gaping black hole in the ability of the MPS to provide the policing London needs. Closing down half the front counters saves £10 million in revenue costs. If we sent off the ones that I am told have the best value for money, another £170 million from revenues, that is spent on IT, which we need to do, by the way, to make our MPS do the stuff we expect it to do. We are trying to reduce savings elsewhere, but at the end of the day there are very few things I have at my disposal.
The one thing I have is human beings. The biggest expenditure we have is police officers. We have already cut almost 3,000 police staff, but at the end of the day, if there are no back-office staff doing this stuff, these guys are going to be the back-office staff. If it comes to a stage where there is only bone left, and the bone is Martin [Hewitt] and 30,000 of his colleagues, I am trying to go for the meat, and the meat is mergers; the meat is front office closures. I appreciate some colleagues from a certain political party want to quibble about process. I am happy to improve process, but the substantive choice I have to make is: how I make the books balance. I have to make the books balance and that means, I am afraid, Andrew, making tough choices about borough mergers and making tough choices about front office closures. I do not want to do any of those things, but I have no other way to maximise the number of police officers. Every £1 I save with a borough merger, every £1 I save with a front office closure, I spend that on a police officer.
Andrew Dismore AM: I do not think anybody questions the fact you are making tough decisions because of decisions made by the Conservative Government --
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): I am going to stop you there, Andrew. I want to move on.
Andrew Dismore AM: I have one further question.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Just quickly.
Page 39 Andrew Dismore AM: It is for Mr Hewitt, and that is looking at savings. You have set out this all very well. One saving that was being looked at was the scrapping of Chief Inspector and Commander ranks, and that I understand has now been reversed. What was the rationale for that?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): The reversal?
Andrew Dismore AM: The reversal.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): That decision was taken to be looked at and we looked at that decision. The new Commissioner was appointed and understandably, when the new Commissioner arrived, she wanted to look at that decision. Where she has arrived was that she did not believe - and the decision was that we did not believe - that taking two complete ranks out of the system was the right way to move forward. What we are doing, is delayering the system, so that we can delayer the number of leaders. We have already as part of our savings over the last four or five years removed significant numbers of leaders from sergeant and upwards within the structure and maintained the constable numbers where we have. Each of the areas of the business is producing structures that take away that an officer automatically goes up every rank in a chain of command, and then also removing various layers of leadership and management.
The principle behind the original decision was, one: there is a money saving - it is actually not huge if you take those two ranks - but predominantly it was around allowing more empowerment down to people as low as you can down in the organisation to get on and make decisions, so reducing some of that hierarchical element. It also improves communication as well because you are closer to the point of who you are trying to communicate with, rather than again working through. The principle of delayering our levels of leadership in any given area are remaining, but we are not doing it by removing completely two particular ranks out of our rank structure. As an aside that is relevant, nonetheless, legally speaking, the legislation that allows that to happen I do not think has received assent yet anyway. The point is that Cressida’s [Dick QPM, Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis] approach was she wants the delayering to allow greater empowerment and greater communication, but she wants to do it in a way that we look at each area in a bespoke way, rather than simply removing two ranks.
Andrew Dismore AM: Going back to the Mayor’s financial problems, the delayering or whatever you call it is going to save the same amount of money as scrapping the ranks?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Correct. It saves the money, yes.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): If we continue on the engagement process around the closures, many of my colleagues here have attended some of these events. I was at the Sutton one last week where we had the princely sum of about 18 people there. There is some disappointment around the process. Caroline, did you want to speak to this?
Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM: Some of the public meetings on your plans to close police stations and front counters have already taken place. Do you accept that perhaps it has not been MOPAC’s finest hour in terms of the notice given for some of these meetings, and what early feedback have you received from these events?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): If there is criticism about the way the local MPS has organised some meetings, we are happy to look into that, but the way people can respond is a number of ways: the website; responding to leaflets; they can write to us; they have already responded by email; they can attend the public meetings. The numbers who have responded on the front counter closures already exceeds the numbers who responded to the 2013 Police and Crime Plan. I make this distinction which is very important. In 2013 the
Page 40 Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime at that stage was consulting on a Police and Crime Plan which included substantive changes around policing for 20-20-20. It was changing neighbourhood policing from 3-2-1 to 1-1, and also police station front office closures. Our Police and Crime Plan response was greater than all those put together. Secondly, I increased the number of DWOs, but thirdly, the consultation now is just on front office closures. We have already exceeded that.
MOPAC has done the process right, but of course there are things that the neighbourhood police can improve upon. It does not make sense, for example, organising a meeting on the same day, as Keith Prince AM alluded to, as a full council meeting. It does not make sense because ward councillors know their communities really well, and in that area the Borough Commanders agreed to have another meeting. It does not make sense for all the meetings to be at a certain time for those who work in shifts and stuff, but again public meetings are one way for people to respond. There are many other ways.
Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM: I accept there are many other ways, but some people want to come along to hear and to understand what the issues are and to have that dialogue. I understand attendance has been quite limited in some of the meetings so far, but will you review the way in which MOPAC conducts consultations in the future - Transport for London (TfL) has been reviewing its processes - to learn from best practice to make sure that enough notice is given and the public can properly engage in such big decisions?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): We should always review how we do consultation, and I am always happy to amend and change how we do consultation. What I am keen to do, my vision, is to turn Londoners from consumers to active citizens, and one way of doing that is by trusting them and by consulting in different ways. That is one of the reasons why we are trying to find other ways to involve people. For many people, a public meeting is important, but for many others, they deem it old-fashioned or they do not want to do it and stuff. You make a fair point. Will we learn lessons? Answer: yes, to make sure we can make it even better.
Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM: What early feedback have you had from these first few meetings?
Sophie Linden (Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime): Just in terms of the consultation meetings, they are varied in attendance. I have been to ones that have had over 200 and [ones that had] 70, but they do vary and some are not so well-attended, but we are getting attendances at them.
In terms of feedback, people are coming. To be frank, people, as you would expect, are worried. It is a change in a service. People do like to have their front counter in the community. We have also talked about the other aspect of the consultation document, which is public access and engagement. It is not just about front counters. At the meeting that both Andrew [Dismore AM] and Sian [Berry AM] were at last night, that I was at as well, they spent a lot of time talking about what information they wanted from the police, how they could engage with the police and how they could work with the police together around Safer Neighbourhood Boards and the panels, but we are getting feedback around residents not wishing to have their front counters closed. I understand that, but we put the figures to them about the number of people who are coming through the doors of the front counter and how the public are already voting with their feet around the numbers coming in. Only 8% of crimes in London are reported over the front counter. We have other methods for people to report their crimes, and we have talked about the 999 response, but there is always that fundamental contract that the police, in an emergency, will be there.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): One of the things that the Chairman and Susan Hall AM referred to is a concern about people thinking that because the front office closes, the police will not be in the area and stuff. That concern is a concern that members of the public have. That is one of the things that, as AC Martin Hewitt referred to, we have to do a better job at, when it is the case, reassuring the public that front office closing
Page 41 does not mean police leaving. The concern that the Chairman and Susan Hall AM referred to is a legitimate concern that many people have.
Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM: I envisage you will end up making some changes to your planned closures, either changing which police stations you might close or front counter, or is it because you have a budget deficit which is --
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): No. The decision to make savings is one that is almost set in stone. The issue as to which front offices close, where the 24/7s are, which boroughs have maybe more than one, that is up for discussion, genuinely, and there is a proper consultation, with a caveat. The money people are saying to me, “This building is worth more setting off than that building”, and I have to be frank. That is a factor that I am putting into the equation. What I am told, for argument’s sake, £10 million revenue savings by closing half the front office counters, potentially £170 million by sales and capital, I am not going to pretend that is not a factor when it comes to us making decisions. The consultation is genuine, subject to those caveats that I will refer to.
Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM: Finally, in terms of your local policing, you have talked about the officers you are going to be putting back in towards DWOs. In Lambeth, how they are structured, they currently have five or six police per ward who work, dedicated effectively, in those wards. A few are able to be abstracted but they are already aligned with wards. Your new plans for two DWOs and a Police Community Support Officer (PCSO) are going to mean a reduction in those officers that work in those areas, and those officers are likely to be transferred to response teams.
There is a concern that police will be further away from the wards where they patrol. Have you considered this as part of your plans? It sounds like almost in some parts of London they might see a reduction.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Just to reassure through you those residents, the two DWOs plus the one dedicated PCSO is a floor, not a ceiling. What is happening now is that many, many wards have nowhere near the floor. What we are doing is guaranteeing that floor across London. Some wards will have a floor that is a bit higher, in the high crime areas, but the Borough Commanders will have lots of flexibility around the officers they have and how they use them. Lambeth is a good example of where you have an excellent council working in partnership with the Borough Commander there, doing a good job. I was at Lambeth Police Station not too long ago. I am confident that the residents in those wards will continue to see good service.
Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM: You are envisaging in places like Lambeth these officers will also be allocated to those wards, so they will have as big a team as they have now?
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): This again forms part of what the merger plan was identified to do. As the Mayor says, the two police officers and the one PCSO is the minimum for all of the 629 wards, and then our aspiration is, as I have already said, to double the number of Safer Schools Officers, so we get up to a figure of there or thereabouts, 600 schools officers, to be either in a one-to-one relationship with our more challenging senior schools or Pupil Referral Units, or in a one to a number relationship with less challenging or primary schools. Then, additionally, to put other ward officers in those wards where we feel that the demand is such that it allows you to have a greater number of officers. That is the aspiration, and that takes us to a much larger number of officers in those wards.
That is all predicated on where we end up in terms of our numbers when we know what the financial settlement is, where or how far we can go. There is absolutely no proposal that takes away, particularly in
Page 42 places where there is a real demand for those officers, and we are completely committed to the value that those ward officers bring in terms of that day-to-day community policing.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Len has a question to me.
Len Duvall AM: To you, Chairman. Can we get this information? That is not the reality on the ground across London. Yes, I do accept what the Mayor is saying that it is a starting block, a building block, but if we could have the details where you think there is an uplift in those wards across London so that we can gauge that and see where they are, because we are not convinced that that is actually what is happening on the ground. The school officers are a very interesting wait-and-see, but DWOs, we would like to see what that looks like and where the uplift is taking place.
Andrew Dismore AM: There is subtext to that if the local authority is making a contribution towards the cost of that. In Camden Town, for example, the local authority is paying towards extra officers and so it would look a bit distorted.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): They sit over and above. In all the calculations, those that are directly funded sit over and above. Just to be really clear, we have not moved to that situation yet. We have the two pathfinder sites that have moved to that situation, but this has already been identified in boroughs such as Lambeth. They are already armed with DWOs.
Len Duvall AM: But that is not the case in the Greenwich Gangs Unit, which you are going to lose, on the merger, resources provided by the Council because that is not over and above. They are actually providing a gangs unit which is funded in the MPS and] in other boroughs. It is all interesting, Chairman. Let us get some facts --
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Yes. We can do that.
Len Duvall AM: What you are trying to tell us, I take it in good faith, but I do not think that is happening on the ground.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): I shall write to you, because I am also interested in the hubs, which we do not have time to talk about, because that is absolutely key. We will write. I will pass the letter past the party Group Lead Members.
Tony Arbour AM: I have just had the opportunity, Mr Mayor, to read your press release on all the things you were going to tell us this morning. Many of the things you have not got around to and I am sure that is our fault and you intended to do so, but one thing I have picked out is this. You say, “For every £1 of counterterrorism spent in response to an incident, an additional £2 is spent on necessary additional non- counterterrorism activity”.
I wonder if you are able to back that up, and I wonder whether Mr Hewitt is able to say that it is true that for every £1 spent on counterterrorism, an extra £2 is spent on other activities.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Let me respond to that, Chairman. The MPS and MOPAC and AC Rowley QPM [MPS] did some analysis after the Westminster Bridge attack because there was a concern around the presumption being made that because counterterrorism funding had been ringfenced, we had sufficient resources to deal with a terrorist attack. What the work undertaken showed was for every £1 in response to the terror attack an additional £2 was spent from other places, from core funding if you like. The
Page 43 evidence we have from Manchester is in fact probably more than that. The point of this piece of work is, even though counterterrorism funding may be ringfenced and protected, that does not mean that we can deal with the challenges faced by terrorism going forward. Is that a fair summary?
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Tony, answer that.
Tony Arbour AM: I am sorry you did not get around to that in the thing.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): I did, Chairman. To be fair, I did. If you read the transcript --
Tony Arbour AM: No, but you have actually quantified it.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): I did before, and so did Martin.
Tony Arbour AM: Yes, but £2 for £1 is the crucial thing. We of course, as was expressed during the meeting, are very sympathetic to see that you absolutely must be funded properly for this. What you are effectively saying here is that there are additional costs related to counterterrorism, significantly, twofold by this. If we were given proper access to this information, you could be quite certain that we on this side, certainly in regard to activities in London, will be happy to support you. I can possibly say this on your behalf, Mr Chairman, as a member of the Conservative Party Group here. We would want that figure to help us make your case in relation to getting more funds. That is why I say I have only just seen this information now.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Chairman, can I just say through you earlier on today I referred to one- third and two-thirds. That is £1 and £2. In previous MQTs I have referred to £1 and £2 on a number of occasions and £2 for every £1. Deputy Commissioner Craig Mackey QPM at the Police and Crime Committee4 and the transcript I was reading last night has referred to £2 versus £1, but I am of course happy, Chairman, to send to you --
Tony Arbour AM: We want to know how that is calculated.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): It would be nice to quantify it. That is fine.
Unmesh Desai AM: Deputy Mayor, very roughly, off the top of your head, given that 6 October - the deadline for consultation - is just around the corner, how many responses have you had by email, very roughly? I will not hold you to it.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): We have a figure for that and we will give it to you shortly.
Sophie Linden (Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime): We have had 531 people online and 255 written responses so far.
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): As you will appreciate, it is towards the end of the consultation where there is suddenly a big --
Unmesh Desai AM: While we have you here, Mr Mayor, and I am conscious of your time, can I just make this point about the messaging of the current situation that we face? I know it is difficult to sell a message about facts, figures and so on, but if you look at the messaging, say, around “London is open”, that has been very
4 Police and Crime Committee meeting held on 20 July 2017.
Page 44 effective. We have seen it all around the Tube stations, everywhere. With this argument that you have the issue of dealing with £400 million of cuts to make and more cuts possibly to the police funding formula and so on, it is about getting that message across. I know you said you always look at ways of selling your message, but the issue that I have with police station closures is that people do equate that with losing a police service, which is not the case.
When you get the financial facts over, can you then just look at the way your marketing people work? There are ways, but it is getting that message across. We would accept it is difficult with facts, figures and so on. The point that you made about land values being taken into account, that is certainly true, I have been told, in the case of Dagenham Police Station.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): I take on board the issue that was raised by Unmesh Desai AM.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): We will be interested very much post-consultation on the number of responses and we will be probably writing to you around that.
The last set of questions - hopefully, Mayor, you will stay for these - is with Len around challenges for the Police and Crime Plan and other related issues.
Len Duvall AM: It is about the resources. Mr. Mayor, you have a Police and Crime Plan and you are in conversation with the Government about the resources, and at some stage something might have to give around that. The same question to the MPS would be: what are the radical options if you do not get the desired result from Government? I do not want to say that we are giving up now because we should not because there are some very good arguments; but what is the thinking about at what stage you consider that in terms of the relationship to the Police and Crime Plan and then to the MPS about borough merging or is just tinkering? Is it just tinkering on a worst-case scenario?
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Can I just answer your question directly, by saying one of the problems around policing is it does not stand still? Martin Hewitt has referred to some of the new challenges around digital, new challenges around online crime, new challenges in relation to a number of issues that were not around. Modern slavery is a big priority for us going forward. I know it is a big passion of your around violence against women and girls, how we deal with these issues, underreported crimes. You have seen in the media legitimate talk about the abuse women suffer on public transport. The point I am making is we cannot simply cut off business as usual like you would in a normal business because our business is growing all the time. Crime is now more complex than it was years ago.
The priorities in the Police and Crime Plan are our priorities. Vulnerability is very important to us. Consulting local communities about their two priorities is very important to us. For obvious reasons, violent crime is a priority for us. Knife crime and acid attacks we have seen in the recent past are really important. These will carry on being priorities as far as we are concerned. I am afraid, even though I would like to wish away terrorism, I cannot wish it away, and that is why it is really important we invest in those services that help the counterterror team do their job so well.
One of the things we want to do, Len, is make it easier for people to report crime. At some stage the police have to triage, and I will not criticise the police when it comes to triaging. In those crimes where the victim is not vulnerable and they are not violent crimes, they tended to deal with it a different way in the past. I, for example, have been given evidence of one police force that deals with 40% of its crimes over the telephone. The detection rates are not bad and the outcomes are not bad. The numbers of crimes we deal with on the
Page 45 telephone are quite small. I am not going to criticise these guys for triaging early on and then finding new ways to deal with some of those crimes. They can give face time to the more vulnerable victim.
Also, Len, I have to say that one of the things I have been told by the experts is, even if we did not have financial pressures, they would probably be advising us to reduce the number of front counters. Why? Because the figure, as Sophie [Linden] says, is only 8% of crimes are reported via the front counter, 70% by telephones and 37% want to report crimes online. Also, if the expert advice is from HMIC, by merging detectives together, by having safeguarding closer together, you can help the quality of service received by the victim, I am not going to be against that and stuff as well.
In broad terms, what I am not going to do and what would be irresponsible for me to do is to say, “Crimes A, B and C will not be dealt with at all”, because crime is crime. Crime is growing, and it is more complex and stuff. Martin, do you want to deal with --
Martin Hewitt (Assistant Commissioner, MPS): Yes. We definitely have not given up in terms of the argument, and there is not only a bit of work that we are doing in London around what we think that demand resources equation looks like, but also working with Dave Thompson QPM, who is the Chief Constable of West Midlands Police, who is doing the national bit of work from the National Police Chiefs’ Council. We have a situation where resourcing has been reducing and demand is growing, not only in the sense that there is more of what there was, but there are new things, and we have seen and we have spoken all morning about the other factors.
What are we doing? We are doing a lot around demand reduction at that end of the equation, so there are things where our processes are not as good as they could be, and we are reducing a load of internal bureaucracy to make it easier for our officers to do what they need to do. The whole roll-out and transformation that we are undertaking as an organisation is partly because we have only got a certain budget and we have to save money, but it is equally about making ourselves fitter and better to do the job that we need to do. You go and talk to people in the boroughs where the mobility devices have arrived, which makes the officers so much more productive. It is good.
The merger process that we are going through does not feel like it is a bit piecemeal when you are sitting in my particular chair, but what it does, if we can get that to a place where we have systems that work and we have structures that work, it will allow us to be more much effective and make better use of our resource. We are also pushing a lot more into our digital offer. As the Mayor just alluded to, we are almost the reverse of other police forces in terms of how much gets dealt with in a telephone or virtual sense, compared to a physical sense. We have just opened up the telephone and digital investigation unit literally a few weeks ago. We trialled it a little bit. We have now opened it up. We hope that lots of people will be able to get quick, sensible service quickly without having to -- it frustrates victims when they have to wait around and we do not turn up because something else has happened. As you all well know, our role is quite chaotic at times and events get in the way. All of those, but then when you strip all of that back, you also then are looking at those priorities. For me, and certainly I know for Cressida [Dick], the priority is around violent offences. You described it in your earlier question about where people really are having harm done. That for me is the priority.
I do not want to get us into a place where we say we are not doing X or Y, because X or Y may always have some sort of vulnerability. Everything in our world in crime is two-sided, isn’t it? You have the vulnerability on one side and you have the dangerousness on the other, and we need to be focusing our efforts and use all our systems to prioritise those people or those groups who are more vulnerable, and then equally prioritise those people that are more dangerous on the offender side as well. It is working through all of that demand
Page 46 management, it is all the other transformation stuff to make ourselves more effective and efficient, but fundamentally we will end up with a number of officers that we can afford or the Mayor can afford. In the Plan, the priorities and the high harm point you to those areas where we would obviously have our focal point. Of course, with London you have the additional thing that no other force really has in terms of dealing with all that goes on in this city in terms of protest and events and disorder and all the other things that come with being the capital. That gives us again a priority that sits off at the side that quite honestly for a small provincial force is not there as well. We are constantly trying to balance all of those, but that demand management work and the active work that we are doing locally and nationally around making the case for resources is the combination of what we are doing.
Len Duvall AM: I do apologise for the way that I described borough mergers. It is hard, but it is almost like borough mergers: what is the next stage of change and is the MPS ready for that and prepared to do that? It is about that continual process which the police face. We will no doubt return to that, Mr Mayor.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Do not forget, Len, the two things coming around the corner are hopefully the positive Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR) next year, but we also have the funding formula change. Our answer is caveated with: who knows what the police funding formula is going to be? Who knows what the CSR is going to be next year?
Len Duvall AM: I just think over the next five to ten years the way that policing is done is radically going to change in a way where we need to protect some of those issues that are there. That is not a case of picking and choosing because, Mr Mayor, you are right that you cannot pick and choose, but the way and how you do it is going to change. That is the interesting bit that we will need to return to, and I know there is a discussion coming back. The discussion did start before 2000, early 2000, and then stopped, and is now going to come back. In terms of savings, the savings regime, and operationally where it can be a better outcome, I accept that that may well be the case, but it is hard when the public have an expectation of not understanding what that is about. Unless we get that communication right and that messaging right, there always will be problems.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Can I just say this as well in response to what you said, which is very thoughtful? In the context of the recent past, the last few years, crime has been going up in London. Crime has been going up across the country. Crime has been going up across the western world. What adds to your comments and your analysis is the context is also crime is going up. I have studied this, I speak to experts and try to find out about solutions. If, for example, there is a place in the western world that is managing to deal with the issue of increasing crime with limited resources, I want to pinch that idea. No one is doing it. That is the challenge. I would not want you to think it is just a London problem. It is a big problem for everyone.
Len Duvall AM: Thank you, Mr Mayor, for that. Can I just return to the night-time economy in terms of one of those strands? You should be commended in highlighting the work for the London economy. From an aspect of policing and issues around that, some of our problems - the lawbreaking and some antisocial behaviour around violence - arise from some aspects of that night-time economy. There is a concern around this table, and we have had conversations with both the MPS and Sophie Linden, but this is an opportunity where you could say something around us working with decent owners of venues who want to do the right thing and not wait to be done to, who do engage with both the council licence of authorities as well as the policing. The Fabric example - and I know you were looking for examples and I understand that - was probably the right example. I have seen public papers, not private papers, of where I thought two organisations like the council and the police should be commended on the work they did there around Fabric, of an owner or management that did not want to engage with both policing and the council to do the right thing.
Page 47 In terms of how I can describe it, how do we work within that night-time [economy], the promotion of that, and issues, beyond the right side of the good people that want to do the best practice, want to work with the agencies in making sure their clients are safe, that they minimise neighbourhood nuisance, and they are doing it? I know we are doing stuff on designing out issues, but these are very important issues about where policing is when we have limited resources to put into those issues. What worries me are the mixed messages that may come out, and I do not think we have got our messaging quite right on those issues, albeit I understand about the loss of venues. I understand that. That particular example was not a good one, but equally I just want the message sent out that we are not going to get soft on people who seek to evade, who seek to dodge their responsibilities in making it safe or try to get around loopholes. I know it is adversarial and it is not very pleasant sometimes, and people maybe have some arguments, but we cannot afford to have those mixed messages. Really just about that, thinking about how we are going to go through that over the next phase of supporting the night-time economy, which we should do here, but at the same time getting the balance about keeping people safe. Keeping people safe and making sure that we are dealing with responsible owners, rather than sticking up for the irresponsible ones. Quite frankly, they are a minority but they do detract from police resources and council resources in dealing with their activities.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): I will answer that, Chairman, in the context of a Police and Crime Committee, which is --
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): The Economy Committee is already --
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Exactly, and that is why I was saying and so I will answer in the context of policing and crime and antisocial behaviour and the negatives. We can sometimes get in danger of associating nightlife with crime, and that is not what Len is trying to do. For somebody reading the transcript, I am answering in that context.
The context is this. The responsible managers and owners of night-time leisure activity work closely with the police and the local council, and they do a good job. Often things do not become a problem because there is that conversation taking place. One of the reasons, by the way, why I am so passionate about the DWO is because they build up a relationship with local businesses. They get to speak to the resident who has been up all night because of the noise being too loud or people doing night-time leisure stuff outside their homes, and they can speak to them, and that officer can then go and speak to the bar owner or whatever it might be.
The issue is the disproportionate amount of time being spent by the police and the council dealing with the bad manager/owner of the venue. It could be a bar, it could be live music or plays. It could be whatever. One of the things that Amy Lamé [Night Czar] and the Night Commission are trying to do is to try and spread best practice. The Commission includes local authorities, the police, licensing experts and others to make sure we can spread that best practice. Martin [Hewitt] used the phrase ‘demand management’. One of the ways you can reduce demand is by nipping these things in the bud. It is really important we do that.
A lot of the work we are doing, working closely with Amy and with the economy team, is around prevention, the quality of life issue. You will be aware, if you are a neighbour, a resident, and you receive low-level antisocial behaviour every night for a year, that is massive for you. When you log these calls it might be a minute and not a serious call because it is noise or it is puking or it is urination or whatever, but cumulatively for that person it has a huge impact on their quality of life. That is one of the reasons I go back to the importance of community policing. Community police are the building blocks for addressing some of the problems with counterterrorism, whether it is dealing with some of the challenges around the night-time economy.
Page 48 I will end this, though, Chairman. You reminded me about the economic consequences. One out of eight jobs in London are in the night-time economy. One out of eight jobs. We have to embrace it but make sure we act responsibly, because nobody wants quality of life deterioration because of nightlife.
Len Duvall AM: That is the important message there which I think we all agree with, but the trouble is, in promoting best practice, the people on the ground have to administer their laws. What they do not want is to be looking over their back and thinking they have to go soft because they want to support that. There is no compromise around safety or issues arising from violence, and that is the message that we ought to be along there and sending the message back to those potential owners of businesses, “We want you to thrive, we want you to do well, but we want people to be safe. You have some responsibilities in doing that. It is not just us. Where you do not take up your responsibilities, we will act, and it is right and proper that we enforce, where deaths occur in venues, that we will go in and do that”.
On the issue about Fabric, there was an investigation and observance of breaking laws. It is not a question of the bureaucracy saying, “Thank you, I want to close down a venue because we feel like it”, which is what came over in that social media. “We just had a thing about anti-drugs.” While the law is there, we need to enforce it and we need to keep people safe, and that is why I am worried about the mixed messages in terms of what we send out and what we say. I am on board with you. I want a thriving night-time economy, but I want people to be safe. Yes, they can make choices and there is an element of individuality about it, but when it comes to laws that we are asking people to enforce or to administer around that, there is no choice in that. People need to come to play where there are issues.
I would welcome Amy and Philip Kolvin QC [Chair, Night Time Commission], to say that and make that clear. I do think there is an issue with Philip in some of his work that he is doing. While he is still doing cases where there is licence involved in London, and in terms of supporting you and giving you advice, there may well be potential conflicts of interest. Mr Mayor, that is for you to sort out, to look into and make sure and protect him as much as others around that in terms of the business.
The night-time economy is a very important piece of work. Everyone here would support that. Equally, the safety of Londoners and people that attend those venues is there. I have used Fabric - it is just an example - where I did some investigation about looking at what was available in public and coming to a conclusion. I might not have it all. I suspect there is a little bit more. To say that the agencies just choose to target one issue without good cause is just wrong. It is myths, and we need to challenge that. Agencies respond to where there is a concern, and that is why they take the actions they do. We want people to engage with us. We do not close down venues lightly. It is the engagement process that was failing on that part. The outcome was the same that could have been done a number of months before. If Fabric had engaged, I suspect that the set of licensing issues that were done were actually there. They lost out because of their business, because they did not engage, and that is where we were. I just think we have to get that messaging right. In terms of City Hall mayoral messaging as well as the policing message, it comes together. I do not see support for a night-time economy in conflict with that, but being very clear to those people that think they are going to dodge their responsibilities, dodge the laws, we have to be very clear on that.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Mr Mayor, I do not expect a long response. We, across the whole Committee, support Len’s thoughts around that. We will return to that particular subject another time.
Unmesh Desai AM: Mr Mayor, I am glad you said what you said. Just to back up what Assembly Member Duvall has said very eloquently and very strongly, I attended a consultation meeting in Brick Lane where your Night Czar, Amy Lamé, was there. I am afraid the impression that came over to the people there, about 100 people - they were not NIMBYs or anything like that - was that we see the night-time economy in terms of
Page 49 pound signs and not what they suffer, something that you are aware of, the puking etc. At the Spitalfields Forum, which is the local planning forum where there was a guest speaker a few months ago, again the same point came across. This afternoon some of us are going to the [Queen Elizabeth] Olympic Park to finish off our review into policing of the Olympic Park and Westfield and so on, and we will revisit the issue again. I am conscious of the time. I know you have taken our message on board. We support the night-time economy. There is also the undesirable side of it. Yes, it is not just about the crime side. It is about the economy, but also making sure that residents are reassured.
Sadiq Khan (Mayor of London): Can I say, Chairman, the way that both Assembly Member Duvall and Assembly Member Desai have made their points are ones that I understand, and it is really important that in the interest of promoting any business you do not inadvertently have residents and Londoners who are suffering the consequences of that, particular when they can be addressed with good management.
Can I say this in reassurance to the Assembly Members? The police cannot be pressurised to give bad advice in relation to a licensing application. They will give the advice based on the evidence that they will give, and I think it is right and proper that none of us can put pressure on them to change their advice. Similarly, a licensing committee recognises the responsibility upon them for the reasons you said, Len. But for the grace of God, if somebody suffers a fatality or another injury because of a bad decision, they recognise what are the consequences of doing that. What is important is for an accommodation to be reached. We live in a global city of 8.8 million people. The level of inconvenience that some residents suffer is not acceptable and we have to make sure we address that, but also there is an accommodation to be made, and we can find a way through that, respecting and empathising with the concerns of residents, but also that businesses who are responsible want to do right by those residents. We need to make sure we weed out the irresponsible businesses and promote and support the responsible ones.
Steve O’Connell AM (Chairman): Again, I have the same issues in Croydon. Thank you for that response, Mr Mayor.
On the topic of Notting Hill - we are going to return to that - we shall write to the Commissioner. The Commissioner is with us in a month’s time and we will pick up on Notting Hill at that time.
I would like to thank our guests for today. Thank you, Mr Mayor, for staying that little bit longer. Thank you, Deputy Mayor. Thank you, AC Hewitt.
Page 50 Agenda Item 4
Subject: Summary List of Actions
Report to: Police and Crime Committee
Report of: Executive Director of Secretariat Date: 17 October 2017
This report will be considered in public
1. Summary
1.1 This report sets out for noting actions arising from previous meetings of the Committee.
2. Recommendation
2.1 That the Committee notes the completed and ongoing actions arising from previous meetings of the Committee, as listed in the report.
Meeting of 20 September 2017
Minute Subject and action required Status Action by item 4 Question and Answer Session with the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and Metropolitan Police Service
During the course of the discussion, the Mayor: In progress Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime Reiterated the commitment to keep the Committee informed about the forthcoming (MOPAC) knife prevention media campaign;
Agreed to explore the idea of establishing a domestic abuser register; Agreed to provide an explanation of the calculation that an additional £2 is spent on policing for every £1 spent on counter terrorism, following a terrorist incident in London; and Continued …
City Hall, The Queen’s Walk, London SE1 2AA Enquiries: 020 7983 4100 minicom: 020 7983 4458 www.london.gov.uk Page 51
Agreed to take on board the comments In progress MOPAC raised by Unmesh Desai AM about the messaging to the public concerning the proposed closure of some police stations as set out in the MOPAC and Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) Public Access and Engagement Strategy consultation, particularly around the perception that it will reduce the number of police officers in an area.
The Committee to receive an update on the In progress MOPAC number of responses received to the Public Access and Engagement Strategy consultation once the consultation period had ended.
The Chairman stated that he would write to the In progress Scrutiny Manager Metropolitan Police Service, following consultation with party Group Lead Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM in relation to the proposed creation of policing hubs within Borough Command Units.
The Chairman to write to the Commissioner, The Chairman has MPS MPS, regarding the Committee’s questions on written to the Notting Hill Carnival. Commissioner.
During the course of the discussion, the In progress MPS Assistant Commissioner, MPS, undertook to:
Provide data on the response times for S (significant) priority calls in the pathfinder boroughs; and
Continued …
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Provide data on: o Which wards currently have an uplift in Dedicated Ward Officers (including how many officers are in that uplift) and which wards are planned to have an uplift as a result of the creation of Borough Command areas; and o Which local authorities are contributing financially to an uplift in Dedicated Ward Officers, in which wards, and how many officers.
Meeting of 6 September 2017
Minute Subject and action required Status Action by item 5 Antisocial behaviour in London
During the course of the discussion, Commander In progress MPS Bennett, MPS, agreed to inform the Committee about whether there had been any prosecutions of Travellers for antisocial behaviour offences in the area policed by the MPS.
6 Police and Crime Committee Work Programme
The Committee delegated authority to the Completed – See Chairman, in consultation with party Group Lead report at Agenda Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM, to Item 5. agree the Committee’s response to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) and MPS’s Public Access and Engagement Strategy Consultation. Continued …
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Meeting of 20 July 2017
Minute Subject and action required Status Action by item 6 Question and Answer Session with MOPAC and the MPS
During the course of the discussion, the Deputy Completed – see MOPAC Mayor for Policing and Crime undertook to: letter attached at Appendix 1. Inform the Committee of the number of remaining Accident and Emergency departments which were not sharing data and the reasons why;
Brief the Committee on the forthcoming knife crime prevention campaign; and Arrange for a copy of the street furniture audit of the Notting Hill Carnival footprint to be sent to the Committee once it had been completed.
Meeting of 29 March 2017
Minute Subject and action required Status Action by item 7 Question and Answer Session with MOPAC and the MPS
During the discussion, the Acting Commissioner In progress MPS undertook to provide the Committee with the findings of the recent MPS training exercise on the river.
During the course of the discussion the Deputy Ongoing MOPAC Mayor for Policing and Crime undertook to provide regular updates to the Police and Crime Continued … Committee on borough mergers.
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8 Police and Crime Committee Work Programme
The Committee delegated authority to the The visit will take Scrutiny Manager Chairman, in consultation with the party Group place later in the Lead Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM, year. to agree arrangements for a site visit to the MPS training centre in Hendon to observe the facilities for the training and development of officers.
Meeting of 19 July 2016
Minute Subject and action required Status Action by item Question and Answer Session with MOPAC and the MPS Provide a summary of the types of claims In progress MPS against the MPS and whether they had increased, and confirm the MPS budget for claims.
Meeting of 3 March 2016
Minute Subject and action required Status Action by item 5 Victims and Vulnerability
During the course of the discussion, the In progress MPS representatives from the MPS undertook to provide: An update on the MPS’s modelling for the framework for the transfer of commissioning and budgetary responsibility for custody healthcare services, including liaison and diversion and mental health services; and
Information about how long the Rapid Assessment Interface and Discharge (RAID) pilot would continue.
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Complaints about the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime (DMPC)
Subject and action required Status Action by Deadline, if applicable Complaints about the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime and the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime (DMPC) The Committee agreed, inter alia, to No disclosures to report for Monitoring n/a delegate to the Monitoring Officer all of the period from Officer the powers and functions conferred on 26 September 2017 to it by the Elected Local Policing Bodies 6 October 2017. (Complaints and Misconduct) Regulations, with the exception of the functions set out at Part 4 of the Regulations which may not be delegated; and guidance on the handling of complaints which requires the Monitoring Officer to report, on a regular basis, the summary details (such as can be reported in public), on the exercise of any and all of these functions to the Committee for monitoring purposes.
Transparency Procedure
The Committee agreed Members No disclosures to report for Executive n/a disclose to the Executive Director of the period from Director of Secretariat or his nominated 26 September 2017 to Secretariat representative (within 28 days of the 6 October 2017. contact) details of any significant contact with the MPS and/or MOPAC which they consider to be relevant to the work of the Committee; and such disclosures be reported to the next meeting of the Committee.
Page 56
List of appendices to this report:
Appendix 1 – Letter from the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime to the Chairman, dated 25 September 2017.
Local Government (Access to Information) Act 1985 List of Background Papers: None
Contact Officer: Teresa Young, Senior Committee Officer Telephone: 020 7983 6559 Email: [email protected]
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Page 58 Appendix 1
Page 59 Page 60 Agenda Item 5
Subject: Action Taken Under Delegated Authority
Report to: Police and Crime Committee
Report of: Executive Director of Secretariat Date: 17 October 2017
This report will be considered in public
1. Summary
1.1 This report outlines recent action taken by the Chairman of the Police and Crime Committee in accordance with the delegated authority granted to him by the Police and Crime Committee at its meeting on 6 September 2017.
2. Recommendation
2.1 That the Committee notes the recent action taken by the Chairman of the Police and Crime Committee under delegated authority, following consultation with the party Group Lead Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM, namely to agree the Committee’s response to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service Public Access and Engagement Strategy consultation and notes the response, attached at Appendix 1 to this report.
3. Background
3.1 At its meeting on 6 September 2017, the Police and Crime Committee resolved:
That authority be delegated to the Chairman, in consultation with party Group Lead Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM, to agree the Committee’s response to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service Public Access and Engagement Strategy consultation.
3.2 Following consultation with the party Group Lead Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM, the Chairman responded to the consultation on 28 September 2017.
City Hall, The Queen’s Walk, London SE1 2AA Enquiries: 020 7983 4100 minicom: 020 7983 4458 www.london.gov.uk
Page 61
4. Issues for Consideration
4.1 The Committee is recommended to note the action taken under delegated authority and to notes its response to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service Public Access and Engagement Strategy consultation, as attached at Appendix 1 to this report.
5. Legal Implications
5.1 The Committee has the power to do what is recommended in the report.
6. Financial Implications
6.1 There are no financial implications arising from this report.
List of appendices to this report:
Appendix 1 – Response to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service Public Access and Engagement Strategy consultation.
Local Government (Access to Information) Act 1985 List of Background Papers: Member Delegated Authority Form 833 (Consultation Response)
Contact Officer: Teresa Young, Senior Committee Officer Telephone: 020 7983 6559 E-mail: [email protected]
Page 62 Appendix 1
Chairman of the Police and Crime Committee
City Hall The Queen’s Walk More London London SE1 2AA Telephone: 020 7983 4000 Web: www.london.gov.uk
Steve O’Connell AM Member for Croydon & Sutton Date: 28 September 2017
Sophie Linden Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime MOPAC
(via email)
Dear Sophie
Public access and engagement strategy consultation
Thank you for the opportunity to respond to your consultation on access and engagement. We do not intend to respond to each specific question set out in your paper, but have set out our feedback below, based on our previous work and discussions with you and other stakeholders.
Front counters and contact with the police It is for individual Assembly Members to submit their own views on specific front counter closures in their areas. We have heard that, broadly, stakeholders understand that closing underused front counters may be a way to make financial savings and move towards a more modern police service.1 Many, however, remain concerned about the specific decisions about which front counters will close. The savings and benefits that can be achieved, and what they will be used for, will need to be made clearer to the public so that they understand the reason for change.
The public continues to place a high value on having visible police officers in neighbourhoods and this is a driver of confidence. This committee has for some time raised the issue of officers having to travel long distances to reach their ward when starting their shift, and we look forward to examining the impact of dedicated ward officer hubs on the amount of time officers have to spend engaging with local people.
The consultation paper notes that new community contact sessions will be “flexible and convenient”, with local officers using their knowledge to determine where, when and how sessions take place in a ward. In our discussions about the then draft Police and Crime Plan we
1 See, for example, the discussion that took place at the Budget and Performance Committee on 19 July 2017. Page 63 heard that Dedicated Ward Officers (DWO) should be encouraged to remain with their ward, so they can build up knowledge and relationships with the community. With the onus placed on DWOs to make these sessions a success, this is something MOPAC and the Met will need to keep in mind. MOPAC may also wish to consider how it can support DWOs to choose locations that are accessible to all, for example, with suitable disabled access and any provision for those with English as a second language.
MOPAC and the Met will need to consider how it can help publicise the availability and use of community contact sessions. Part of the reason contact points were not a success may have been because so few people knew about them: demonstrated by the fact that, as the consultation notes, “the closure of some of them seems to have gone unnoticed”. Community contact sessions risk being under-utilised, just as contact points have been, if no one knows about them. MOPAC and the Met will need to closely monitor the usage of these sessions, and ensure that local officers can share good practice across wards and neighbourhoods.
With police counters closing, attention needs to be given to how people will be encouraged to report crimes, particularly underreported crimes. We are concerned at the delays in answering 101 calls and would appreciate further information on the activity currently underway to address this problem and plans to handle any future increases in call numbers. More broadly, we have heard that there needs to be more clarity on how to report a crime, particularly in relation to reporting online. You have told us that “without any publicity, communication, or driving of people to use the website” the number of reports of crimes to the Met on its website has already increased, but MOPAC should set out how it will use its unique position to increase Londoners understanding of the ways in which they can report.
Engagement with the public The involvement of people in Safer Neighbourhood Boards (SNBs), Ward Panels and other community based groups is unlikely to improve if people do not know that they exist, or the work that they are doing.
This committee has stressed the importance of SNBs and Ward Panels as a mechanism to engage the public. In its 2015 report, ‘Safer Neighbourhood Boards: two years on’, for example, the then committee highlighted the progress made by SNBs in delivering valuable work, but found a lack of consistency in how they engage with the public—with some only holding one public meeting per year or having no website—and raised concern about the capacity of SNBs to deliver the types of projects MOPAC expects from them. It recommended that MOPAC:
• promote the work of SNBs through its website and social media channels • publish details of the types of projects SNBs fund and their outcomes • carry out a public review of the core funding it provides to SNBs to ensure it is supporting them to carry out their key functions - holding public meetings, publicity and administrative tasks • help SNBs to carry out a “diversity audit” and develop an action plan to widen the representation of their membership2
2 London Assembly Police and Crime Committee, Safer Neighbourhood Boards: Two years on, December 2015 Page 64
We are pleased to hear that you support the current structure of Ward Panels and SNBs, and recognise that less well performing groups need help to improve. MOPAC should now revisit the recommendations made above and implement them. In the same respect, MOPAC should, in any assessment of Ward Panels, aim to identify and share good practice that would see them strengthened in terms of coverage, diversity and representation. In discussion at our meeting on 20 July 2017, you put the onus on the individual SNBs to promote their work. However, MOPAC should help promote messages about SNBs, Ward Panels and other groups across all boroughs, and consider how it can help to have an impact on awareness and engagement. The introduction of an effective liaison team within MOPAC that SNBs and Ward Panels can interact with should be explored.
Best practice Finally, we would like to raise our concern about the consultation. We welcome the public engagement events being held across each borough as an important way of engaging local residents, but are surprised at the lack of timely and easily available detail about them. The quality of the consultation document also raises concern. As highlighted to you in our meeting on 20 July, many of the questions being asked appear loaded, and intended to steer respondents to a particular answer. The question ‘Do you agree that it is right that the Metropolitan Police Service prioritise police officers over poorly-used front counters?’ is a striking example of this. In addition, the data available in the consultation is poorly presented, giving little referencing or context. We suggest that MOPAC reflect on whether it is meeting best practice guidelines in its consultation efforts.
Yours sincerely
Steve O’Connell AM Chairman of the Police and Crime Committee
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Page 66 Agenda Item 6
Subject: Question and Answer Session with the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service
Report to: Police and Crime Committee
Report of: Executive Director of Secretariat Date: 17 October 2017
This report will be considered in public
1. Summary
1.1 This report serves as a background paper to the monthly question and answer session with the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) and the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS).
2. Recommendations
2.1 That the Committee notes the monthly report from the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime, attached at Appendix 1 to the report, as background to the question and answer session with the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service.
2.2 That the Committee notes the report and answers given by the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime and the Metropolitan Police Service to the questions asked by Members.
3. Background
3.1 The Committee has agreed that it will hold monthly question and answer sessions with the head of MOPAC and invite representation from the MPS.
3.2 MOPAC produces a monthly report providing an update on policing operational and financial performance, as well as the activities and decisions of MOPAC. The report is used to inform questions to MOPAC and the MPS at monthly question and answer sessions. The latest report is attached at Appendix 1.
City Hall, The Queen’s Walk, London SE1 2AA Enquiries: 020 7983 4100 minicom: 020 7983 4458 www.london.gov.uk Page 67
4. Issues for Consideration
4.1 The Commissioner, Cressida Dick CBE QPM, and Deputy Commissioner, Craig Mackey QPM, will join Sophie Linden, the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime, to answer questions on topical issues of importance to policing and crime in London.
4.2 The session is likely to cover the following topics (tbc): Performance; Moped-enabled crime; Hate crime; Modern slavery; Police funding; and Gun crime.
5. Legal Implications
5.1 The Committee has the power to do what is recommended in this report.
6. Financial Implications
6.1 There are no financial implications to the GLA arising from this report.
List of appendices to this report: Appendix 1 – MOPAC Monthly report
Local Government (Access to Information) Act 1985 List of Background Papers: None.
Contact Officer: Janette Roker, Scrutiny Manager Telephone: 020 7983 6562 E-mail: [email protected]
Page 68 Appendix 1
Report to the Police and Crime Committee
Tuesday, 17 October 2017 10am City Hall
Sophie Linden Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime
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MOPAC report to Police and Crime Committee – 17 October 2017
1. INTRODUCTION
This report is provided to the Police and Crime Committee (PCC) for its 17 October 2017 meeting, to assist the Committee to exercise its function in scrutinising and supporting the Mayor’s Office for Policing And Crime (MOPAC) and to hold it to account.
This report covers the period from 9 September to 6 October 2017.
In addition to the range of regular meetings and briefings with key stakeholders, including senior Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) officers, below are the main activities I have been involved in and/or where MOPAC has been represented.
2. MOPAC ACTIVITY REPORT
2.1 Public access meetings During this period, I met stakeholders and attended 14 public meetings across boroughs regarding the public access and engagement strategy. Senior representatives of MOPAC attended a further 20 events. This was part of the consultation process and provided both an opportunity for concerns and questions to be answered and local views on the proposed changes to policing to be heard. The consultation closed on 6 October and responses are now being analysed.
2.2 Safer Neighbourhood Boards Forum On 3 October, I hosted a forum meeting of the Safer Neighbourhood Boards to discuss the public access and engagement strategy consultation. We had a constructive discussion about the difficult financial context and the impact of that on the choices we must make. In addition, I was also able to talk with them about the opportunities for our ongoing engagement with Safer Neighbourhood Boards and their role in supporting the local consultation and implementation of community contact sessions, and in the local priority setting process.
2.3 Child protection On 11 September, I chaired the Child Protection Inspection Oversight Group, the regular mechanism for overseeing the MPS’s response to HMIC’s 2016 report. This meeting focussed on the recent Quarter 2 update report from HMIC (published on 11 August), a stocktake of what had been achieved so far, and considering key barriers and challenges moving forward. The annual re-inspection report is expected to be published in December.
2.4 Justice Matters Round Table - Victims Matter On 12 September, Claire Waxman, the London Victim’s Commissioner chaired the Justice Matters’ Round Table on Victims. We were joined by guests from the MPS, Ministry of Justice (MoJ), Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), National Probation Service (NPS), National Health Service England (NHS), Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS), Citizens’ Advice Bureaux and Victim Support.
The meeting was held in two parts, with the first section examining levels of compliance with the Victims Code of Practice achieved in London by criminal justice agencies. The second part of the meeting explored what drove satisfaction with the criminal justice system for victims.
2.5 Counter Terrorism On 12 September, I met with the Minister-President of Brussels, Mr Rudi Vervoort. This was an opportunity to discuss the Counter Terrorism agenda, and the role of the Mayoral team in countering violent extremism.
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MOPAC report to Police and Crime Committee – 17 October 2017
2.6 Criminal Justice On 21 September, I met with Ben Summerskill, Director of the Criminal Justice Alliance, where we discussed their recent report on the experience of young, black, Asian and minority ethnic people and stop and search.
2.7 The Children’s Society On 22 September, I met with Tom Redfearn from The Children’s Society to discuss the findings of their recent inquiry into safeguarding responses to children who go missing. We talked about the findings in London, MOPAC’s role in ensuring the MPS take appropriate steps to improve and share best practice with partners.
2.8 Meeting with Policing Minister: London police funding. On 27 September, I met with Policing Minister Nick Hurd MP and with Home Office officials to describe the pressures facing policing and make the case for additional funding.
2.9 Meeting with Google On 28 September, I met with Katie Donovan, Public Policy Manager for Google, to discuss online videos, and working more closely with YouTube and Google to ensure the swift removal of online videos where they have violent or extreme content.
2.10 Telephone and Digital Investigation Unit On 29 September, I attended the Telephone and Digital Investigation Unit (TDIU). It was an opportunity to understand how the unit provided a better response to demand and how the needs of victims are addressed by the team.
2.11 Meetings with officials • On 12 September, I chaired the quarterly meeting with the British Transport Police (BTP) and Transport for London (TfL) representatives. This was part of our regular meetings to discuss collaborative ways of working to reduce and prevent crime on London networks.
• On 25 September, I met with union representatives for the MPS police staff, including PCSOs, as part of my quarterly engagement meetings. It was an opportunity to discuss their concerns and share ideas.
2.12 Roads and Transport Policing Command On 4 October, I visited the Roads and Transport Policing Command where we discussed road safety and particular the policing response to crime on bikes and road safety and work undertaken to reduce them.
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MOPAC report to Police and Crime Committee – 17 October 2017
3. PERFORMANCE
Police data are now fully updated on the London data store. In addition, more police and crime data and information and interactive dashboards can be found at: https://www.london.gov.uk/what-we-do/mayors-office-policing-and-crime-mopac/data-and- research. An overview of key crime types are below. MPS Recorded Crime
Oct - Sep 2015-16 2016-17 % change
Total Notifiable Offences (TNO) 762,351 741,382 -2.8% TNO TNO Victim Based 691,577 680,555 -1.6% ASB Anti-Social Behaviour Calls 259,923 262,664 1.1% Violence Against the Person 236,639 224,504 -5.1% Homicide 106 127 19.8% Youth Homicide 19 32 68.4% VWI 75,753 70,565 -6.8% VAP Non-Domestic Abuse VWI 51,630 48,573 -5.9% Serious Youth Violence 6,639 7,224 8.8% Common Assault 65,352 62,800 -3.9% Harassment 80,135 75,448 -5.8% Domestic Abuse Incidents 151,036 134,268 -11.1% Domestic Abuse Domestic Abuse Notifiable 75,615 70,512 -6.7% Domestic Abuse VWI 24,123 21,992 -8.8% Rape 6,071 6,464 6.5% Sexual Offences Other Sexual 11,213 10,695 -4.6% Total Robbery 22,054 26,204 18.8% Robbery Personal Robbery 20,384 24,364 19.5% Business Robbery 1,670 1,840 10.2% Total Burglary 69,448 67,526 -2.8% Burglary Burglary in a Dwelling 44,031 45,769 3.9% Burglary in Other Buildings 25,417 21,757 -14.4% Total Theft Person 34,551 41,754 20.8% Theft and Theft Taking of MV 25,032 27,483 9.8% Theft from MV 50,678 52,928 4.4% Handling Total MV 75,710 80,411 6.2% Shoplifting 46,650 44,160 -5.3% Criminal Damage Total Criminal Damage 64,844 59,143 -8.8% Knife Crime 10,536 12,613 19.7% Knife Crime With Injury 3,918 4,409 12.5% Weapons Knife Crime With Injury victims under 25 (non DA) 1,783 1,894 6.2% Gun Crime 2,151 2,376 10.5% Gun Crime Discharged 304 320 5.3% Racist and Religious Hate Crime 16,762 15,786 -5.8% Faith Hate Crime 2,138 2,312 8.1% Anti-Semitic 491 474 -3.5% Hate Crime Islamophobic 1,354 1,566 15.7% Sexual Orientation Hate Crime 1,973 1,939 -1.7% Transgender Hate 170 178 4.7% Disability Hate Crime 651 445 -31.6%
Jun-16 Jun-17 Change Confidence and "Good Job" Confidence 69% 69% 0% Satisfaction Satisfaction 79% 75% -4%
Aug-16 Aug-17 Change % Change Police Officers 31,453.41 30,512.84 -940.57 -2.99% Police Staff 9,037.73 8,469.53 -568.20 -6.29% Workforce PCSOs 1,533.83 1,363.31 -170.52 -11.12% MSC (Specials) 2,946.00 2,456.00 -490.00 -16.63%
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MOPAC report to Police and Crime Committee – 17 October 2017
4. Quarterly Performance Update Report. Q1 2017/18
4.1 MOPAC have improved quarterly reporting on MPS performance and finances by launching the new Quarterly Performance Update Report which is annexed to this report.
4.2 The new report presents quarterly and annual data on crime in London, focussing on the priorities set out in the Mayor’s Police and Crime Plan.
4.3 The report also provides a detailed description of the financial position in the first quarter on 2017/18 which has previously been provided to the Police and Crime Committee in this Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime report. This includes a breakdown of the revenue, capital and reserves position. In addition the new report provides longer term data going back over recent years.
4.4 A summary of the financial position has been provided below:
4.4.1 The Met are forecasting a £32 million revenue underspend by the end of 2017/18. This includes an underspend of £23m in police officer pay which will be transferred to reserves in order to support officer recruitment plans in future years. 4.4.2 This and other underspends are offset against forecast overspends in overtime and elsewhere in the budget. Some of these overtime overspends are a consequence of the response to the Grenfell fire and recent terror attacks. 4.4.3 Capital investment is forecast to be £268m at the end of 2016/17, against an approved budget of £366m.
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MOPAC report to Police and Crime Committee – 17 October 2017
5 CORRESPONDENCE AND MAYOR’S QUESTIONS
MOPAC manages and prioritises all Mayor’s Questions and correspondence received to ensure that it is meeting its obligation to respond in a timely manner and to a high standard
5.1 Mayor’s Questions (MQs) Mayor’s questions Total received Responded to within In percentage the GLA agreed terms timeframe April 2017 No MQs in April May 2017 No MQs in May June 2017 101 92 91% July 2017 115 105 91% August 2017 110 106 96% September 2017 104 76 73%
5.2 Correspondence received and responded to within 20 days Months Correspondence Number responded to In percentage received within 20 working days terms April 2017 155 99 64% May 2017* 3510 3467 99% June 2017* 3178 3153 99% July 2017 356 318 89% August 2017 249 230 92% September 2017 198 189 95%
* May/June 2017 enquiries includes 6,250 Al Quds emails received and replied to in batches
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MOPAC report to Police and Crime Committee – 17 October 2017
6 MOPAC BUSINESS AND MEETINGS
In the last month, my office and I have had a range of meetings with key stakeholders and MPS officers in support of the Mayor.
6.1 Regular Meetings with: • the Mayor and his Team • the Commissioner and Deputy Commissioner • MPS Senior Officers • Partners including local authorities, criminal justice agencies, government departments, policing bodies, service providers and community groups.
Meetings are covered in section 2 and 6.1.
6.2 Decisions The following formal decisions have been made since the last report:
Policing and Crime Decision Formal Decisions made (PCD) Number PCD 248 Pension Forfeiture: Stage 3 PCD 249 Pension Forfeiture: Stage 1 PCD 253 Insurance Strategy Renewals 2017 PCD 261 Provision of Asbestos Management Services PCD 263 Extension of Capgemini contract Email Services
6.3 Future MOPAC meetings
Date MOPAC Meeting
20 October CONTEST Board 16 November Oversight Board 11 December London Crime Reduction Board 18 December Justice Matters
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Page 76 Mayor’s Office for Policing & Crime Appendix 1 - Annex Quarterly Performance Update Report
Quarter 1 2017/18 Page 77 Page About MOPAC The Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011 established MOPAC has in place robust Governance arrangements to ensure MPS an elected Police and Crime Commissioner for each police force and partners are held to account and that MOPAC continues to monitor area across England and Wales to ensure that there is democratic the objectives, operations and delivery of the PCP are adhered to. This oversight of how policing is delivered. In London, the elected is done through various Boards and Panels, including the quarterly Mayor – Sadiq Khan, is the equivalent of the Police and Crime Oversight Board and other boards and panels which are listed in the Commissioner and is responsible for ensuring that the Annual Governance Statement, published at . Metropolitan Police deliver an efficient and effective service for https://www.london.gov.uk/sites/default/files/20170724_annual_governance_statement_2016_17_fina l.pdf Londoners. The Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) supports the Mayor in fulfilling his role. The Mayor has appointed a statutory Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime – Sophie Linden – to lead MOPAC 78 Page . MOPAC is responsible for setting the overall strategic direction for policing and safety, overseeing police performance in the capital and commissioning a wide range of services to prevent crime and support victims. The Mayor of London is required by law to produce a Police and Crime Plan that explains how the police, community safety partners and other criminal justice agencies will work together to reduce crime. The current Police and Crime Plan (PCP) reflects the Mayor’s manifesto and priorities for making London a safer city for all. The Plan is produced by MOPAC, who consult with Londoners on their priorities, develop the Plan itself and then ensure that its aims MOPAC welcomes comments on this quarterly report. To send any and commitments are delivered. comments and questions please email them to MOPAC Correspondence Team at [email protected]. In fulfilling its responsibilities, MOPAC ensures that its business is conducted in accordance with the law and proper standards and that public money is safeguarded, properly accounted for and the value for money (VfM) principles of economy, efficiency and effectiveness are strongly adhered to. 1 About The Metropolitan Police Service
Operational policing in London is the responsibility of the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Cressida Dick who took up her post in April this year. The Met set out 2017-18 priorities, in line with the Police and Crime Plan, in the Met Business Plan published June 2017. The Met’s progress in Quarter 1 against its Business Plan is set out in Annex A.
The top priorities are: ➢ Tackling violent crime and especially knife crime which affects young people across London ➢ Countering terrorism and reviewing our strategy, tactics and resources in light of the threat ➢ Protecting children and developing a robust approach to tackling child sexual exploitation ➢ Transforming the Met to become a modern police force using technology, data, skills and engagement to fight crime more effectively
£3.3bn budget The Met workforce as at How the Met is funded end of Q1 2017/18: Page 79 Page 30,719 Officers 2,523 Special Constables How the Met spends its budget 1,383 PCSOs 8,500 Staff
Source: MPS Business plan
2 Contents Executive Summary – 4 Finance – 34-41 Measuring progress against the Police and Crime • Finances at a glance Plan Priorities – 5 • Revenue Budget & Trends • Capital Budget & Trends • Reserves A Safer London – 6-12 • Total Notifiable Offences MOPAC Finances – 42-44 • High Harm Crime • MOPAC Commissioning • Recorded crime 12 month average • London Crime Prevention Fund • Anti-Social Behaviour • Local Volume Priorities Page 80 Page • Fraud & Cyber and Gun Crime ANNEX A: BUSINESS MILESTONE REPORT
A better Police Service for London – 13-20 • Public Perception • Victim Satisfaction • Satisfaction & Public Vote – Inequalities • Workforce – Overview & Diversity • Dedicated Ward Officers • Public Complaints
A better Criminal Justice Service for London – 21-24
Keeping children and young people safe – 25-26
Violence against women and girls – 27-29
Standing together against extremism, hatred & intolerance – 30-33
3 Executive Summary
This is MOPAC’s first full quarterly update report for 2017/18 . year forecast includes £11.5m overspend on Counter Terrorism (CT) and Protective Security Grants. Demands caused by the The first quarter of 2017/18 has been a difficult period for terrorist incidents mean that for the first time there is an London as it suffered from further terrorist attacks at London expected national overspend on CT. Additional funding is being Bridge and Finsbury Park and the fire at Grenfell Tower. These sought from the Government, in CT/PS grants as well as special incidents placed a high demand across the Met and the response grants in relation to operational pressures the Met is facing this of its officers and staff in very challenging circumstances received year. high praise. At the start of 2017/18 the Mayor approved a capital programme Current recorded crime figures are showing increases on the last that provided for £366.2m of expenditure with £40m of over- twelve months. Total Notifiable Offences have increased programming. This will be funded from a combination of capital including some high profile categories of crime and violence, such receipts, grants and other contributions. Capital expenditure for as acid attacks in the first quarter. Acquisitive crime has gone up the year is forecast at £268m. including with the use of weapons in offending. Crime increases have been seen across England and Wales, and the latest Significant financial pressures are impacting the Met’s ability to Page 81 Page published figures mostly show crime rising faster outside London. meet the Mayor’s ambition of 32,000 police officers. The Met continues to maintain over 30,000 officers and is doing all it can Positive public perceptions of the police remain high and we see to minimise officer reductions. However, future funding pressures an improving trend across a number of measures. However, there may make that position unsustainable. continue to be notable differences in perception of police within some of London’s communities or age groups, such as Black and The Met is working hard to ensure it continues to become an Minority Ethic (BAME) and younger people. In addition, user even more efficient organisation that enhances value for money satisfaction levels, although relatively high at 75%, are at their to the public purse. The delivery of its transformation programme lowest since FY 2013/14. Of particular concern are the declines in (the “One Met Model”) continues to achieve this goal. Significant the key areas of “satisfaction with police actions”, “follow-up external pressures are having a negative impact on managing after a crime” and “satisfaction overall”. financial resources as funds need to be diverted to emergencies, however the Met is on track to deliver £66m of the projected The report also presents the forecast outturn against the budget £82m savings for this financial year. for Q1. As at the end of Quarter 1 the revenue position is a £21.0m underspend with a full year forecast of a net underspend of £32.2m (1.3%) against a revised budget of £2,504m. The full
4 Measuring progress against the Police and Crime Plan Priorities A new performance framework details what success looks like for London. This documents a move away from blunt pan-London crime reduction targets, in favour of locally agreed policing priorities and a focus on addressing the crimes that cause the greatest harm to individuals – such as sexual assault, domestic abuse and child sexual exploitation. A Safer London
Focus on volume and Mandatory High Harm Priorities high harm priorities
(MOPAC in consultation with ASB plus two borough volume priorities Page 82 Page MPS and Local Authorities) Local Priorities may be evidenced by: Theft (from motor vehicles, shops, person), Non Domestic Abuse Victim With Injury, Common Assault, Harassment, Burglary dwelling, Criminal damage, Robbery Person
A better Police Service for London Victim Satisfaction with Police service Public Perceptions
A better Criminal Justice Service for London
Keeping children and young people safe
Tackling violence against Women and Girls
Standing together against extremism, hatred and intolerance
5 A Safer London
Page 83 Page Focus on high harm and local borough priorities
6 Total Notifiable Offences (TNO)
250,000
205,824 200,000
172,467 150,000
100,000 Page 84 Page
50,000
-
Q2 2015/16 Q2 Q1 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2017/18
The long term trend for total notifiable offences (recorded crime) shows an increase with over 5,000 more offences recorded in Q1 2017/18 compared to the same point last year.
The increase in London reflects – albeit at a lower level – a nationwide increase. Using the most recent national available data (to March 2017), recorded crime in London increased by 4.4% compared to the previous 12 months. The increases across the rest of England and Wales, and across other most similar metropolitan forces (Greater Manchester, West Midlands and West Yorkshire), were greater than in London: 12.5% and 15.8% respectively.
Over the longer term, improved crime recording accounts for some of the increase in recorded offences, particularly in categories such as violence.
7 High harm crime The Met has a particular focus on high harm crimes, a 25,000 top priority in the Mayor’s Police and Crime Plan. These are defined as all domestic abuse offences, knife crime, gun related offending, sexual offences 20,000 and all forms of hate crime. 19,989 Hate crime, sexual offences and knife crime have all
15,000 15,769 increased in recent quarters. The recorded levels of domestic abuse represent approximately one in ten of all recorded crimes in London. These have 10,000 increased to the highest level recorded over the last 3 years. 5,396 5,000 3,219 4,871 Through the Crime Survey of England and Wales it is 3,333 2,367 3,638 known that high harm crimes such as domestic
464 violence and sexual offences are under-reported. - 628 MOPAC and MPS are encouraging better reporting and new ways for victims to report crime. Therefore an increase in recorded crime may also reflect a Page 85 Page
greater confidence in victims reporting their crime to
Q2 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2017/18 Q1 Q1 2014/15 the police. MOPAC and the MPS are developing monitoring mechanisms for levels of repeat Domestic Abuse Knife Crime Gun Crime Total Sexual Offences Hate Crime victimisation, as often these types of crimes are experienced multiple times by the same victim – leading to increased vulnerability. High Harm crimes are a priority for the Met. The growth in demand from domestic abuse, sexual offences and hate crime alongside other areas of demand such as child protection and mental health has led the Met to review how it is configured to best protect vulnerable people. Measures include: • bringing together teams that investigate these crimes into one place • investing more in prevention and problem solving; working closely with partners to identify risk and signpost vulnerable people to the appropriate agency to provide support • making clear that safeguarding is the responsibility of every single police officer. All officers - whether working in neighbourhoods, a response team or investigation - need to be able to be proactive in spotting the signs of individuals who are vulnerable • embedding its safeguarding service in neighbourhood policing. These officers best understand local communities and are at the frontline for protecting vulnerable people - and are best placed to offer victims the appropriate level of support and care and investigate at the earliest opportunity • retaining central specialist capability to investigate the most serious of crimes and provide specialist advice to frontline officers
The Met BCU pathfinder sites are currently testing this new structure, and the ambition is to invest further resources in this critical area across London.
8 Recorded crime 12 month average
Police and Crime Plan Area Crime Category July 2015 - June 2016 July 2016 - June 2017 Change % Change A better police service for London Total Notifiable Offences 748,660 790,473 41,813 5.6% A better police service for London Violence Against the Person 231,876 241,416 9,540 4.1% A better police service for London Total Robbery 21,429 26,336 4,907 22.9% A better police service for London Total Burglary 69,548 70,761 1,213 1.7% A better police service for London Total Theft Person 33,218 41,699 8,481 25.5% A better police service for London Theft Taking of MV 23,345 29,096 5,751 24.6% A better police service for London Theft from MV 49,754 55,745 5,991 12.0% Keeping children and young people safe Knife Crime 9,785 13,121 3,336 34.1% Keeping children and young people safe Gun Crime 1,862 2,645 783 42.1%
Tackling 86 Page violence against women and girls Domestic Abuse 75,068 75,664 596 0.8% Tackling violence against women and girls Total Sexual Offences 16,778 18,214 1,436 8.6% Standing together against hatred and intolerance Racist and Religious Hate crime 15,168 17,629 2,461 16.2% Standing together against hatred and intolerance Sexual Orientation Hate Crime 1,879 2,078 199 10.6% Standing together against hatred and intolerance Transgender Hate Crime 148 203 55 37.2% Standing together against hatred and intolerance Disability Hate Crime 502 596 94 18.7%
Due to the manner in which crime is recorded a single crime could be captured in more than one category. For example, someone assaulting their partner with a knife would be captured within Domestic Abuse and Knife Crime.
Throughout the life of the police and crime plan, MOPAC will monitor key indicators as proxies for areas on which the plan is focussed. The above table illustrates some key crime classifications in relation to the areas of the plan over the last twelve months.
In terms of overall crime comparisons to other areas of England and Wales, the most recently available data is to the end of the last full FY 2016/17. This showed that although there had been an overall increase in crime in London (4.4% compared to the preceding year) that this was much more contained than across the rest of England and Wales (where the increase was 12.5%).
9 Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB)
Anti-Social Behaviour - Nuisance All boroughs across London have anti-social behaviour as part of their 80,000 local priorities in support of the Police and Crime Plan. There are wide 70,000 variations across areas - Westminster had the highest volume of calls in 61375 60,000 57335 Q1 2017/18, followed by Tower Hamlets. 50,000 40,000 In Q1 2017/18 there were over 67,000 calls to the Met related to ASB. 30,000 This was a similar level to last year’s first quarter. Of these 86% were 20,000 classed as ‘nuisance’ related. These are incidents where something 10,000 causes trouble, annoyance, inconvenience, offence or suffering to the 0
local community in general rather than to individual victims.
Q1 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2017/18
Anti-Social Behaviour – Environmental Anti-Social Behaviour - Personal 12,000
7,000 87 Page 10134 6,000 10,000 5,000 8,000 7609 4,000 6,000 3,000 2587 4,000 2,000 2099 1,000 2,000
0 0
Q1 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2017/18
Q1 2014/15 Q1 Q2 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2017/18
ASB reports show a strong seasonality correlated with school holidays. Tackling ASB is fully incorporated into neighbourhoods. It is integrated into the roles of the 2 Dedicated Ward Officers and 1 PCSO per ward (plus an additional 448 DWOs for the busiest wards). Work has been further enhanced by recent training packages for all officers on ASB and a specific full day for Neighbourhood officers.
The Met reviews the performance stats, including challenging poor performance and sharing best practice on ASB, through the ASB Performance Group chaired by Commander Bennett and attended by all boroughs. One emphasis of the work is in tackling repeat victims of ASB. Tower Hamlets have been running a ASB Warning project, which has recently reduced ASB. Hackney have run a project to reduce repeat ASB callers/victims. 10 Local Volume Priorities Instead of focusing on local crime targets set at City Hall, MOPAC have focused on Priority 1 Priority 2 the things that really matter in communities themselves. MOPAC’s new approach % change Q1 % change Q1 17/18 vs Q1 17/18 vs Q1 was developed in partnership with local Met leaders and the elected local Council in Borough 16/17 16/17 Chosen Priorities every Borough. The choice of local priorities were made based upon data and Barking and evidence. In addressing local priorities, neighbourhood officers will work together Dagenham -8% 20% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary with Councils and other partners to take a problem solving approach – not only Barnet -2% 0% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary Bexley 19% 44% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary pursuing and arresting criminals, but also taking enforcement action on the Brent 15% 3% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary problems that drive crime – such as drug dealing. Bromley 30% 20% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary Camden 1% 277% 1) Common Assault 2) Theft from Person This approach was adopted at the beginning of this financial year, in April 2017 and Croydon -15% -2% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary this slide sets out the baseline across London. The map sets out the changes in crime 1) Common Assault 2) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with which mostly pre-dates the setting of these priorities by boroughs. Ealing -6% -11% Injury Enfield -3% -2% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary Performance in the last twelve months 1) Non-Domestic VWI 2) Theft from Motor Vehicle Greenwich -5% -5% (additional priority Theft Person -16%)
Hackney 88 Page 42% 8% 1) Robbery & Theft Person 2) Burglary Hammersmith and Fulham 28% 11% 1) Robbery 2) Burglary Haringey 20% 14% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Robbery Harrow 14% 7% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary Havering 4% 8% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary Hillingdon 70% 0% 1) Robbery 2) Burglary Hounslow 0% 10% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary 1) Common Assault 2) Theft Person Islington 7% 99% (additional priority - Theft of MV +51%) Kensington and 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Theft from Chelsea 13% 26% MV Kingston upon Thames -3% 4% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary Lambeth 23% -6% 1) Robbery 2) Burglary 1) Common Assault 2) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Lewisham 16% -2% Injury Merton -19% -16% 1) Theft of Motor Vehicle 2) Burglary Newham 0% 74% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Robbery Redbridge 15% 30% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary Richmond upon Thames 75% 18% 1) Theft from Motor Vehicle 2) Burglary Southwark 18% -2% 1) Robbery 2) Burglary Sutton 20% -17% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary As can be seen, amongst the boroughs that have seen reductions in the number of Tower Hamlets -1% 12% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Burglary priority crimes in the last twelve months were Barnet, Barking & Dagenham, Enfield and Croydon (which all prioritised tackling burglary as well as violence with injury). Waltham Forest 29% 19% 1) Robbery 2) Burglary Merton and Ealing also experienced reductions. Three boroughs have recorded large Wandsworth -7% 5% 1) Theft from Motor Vehicle 2) Burglary increases in the total volume of recorded offences within their chosen local priorities Westminster 9% 45% 1) Non Domestic Abuse Violence with Injury 2) Robbery - Camden, Islington and Hackney (theft is a common local priority to these three boroughs). 11 Fraud & Cybercrime and Gun Crime
Reported Fraud and Cyber Crime
14,000 In the 12 months to June 2017, residents in the Metropolitan Police 12,000 district reported 42,490 frauds and cybercrimes to Action Fraud. Crimes are allocated to the force best placed to investigate 10,000 10,758 them, so some of these cases will be investigated by other police 9,899 8,000 forces. Similarly, some of the Met’s investigations will be into crimes experienced by people elsewhere in the country. 6,000 The Met’s Operation Falcon specifically targets cybercrime (covering 4,000 both cyber-dependent crime such as computer systems attacks, and 2,000 cyber-enabled crime, whereby existing crimes are facilitated by the use of internet). With an establishment of nearly 300 officers and staff, it is 0 the largest unit of its kind in policing. Falcon’s work is both preventative (with advice, publications and guidance) and investigative (since its
launch end of 2014, more than 600 suspects have been convicted).
Q1 2014/15 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2017/18 Q1 Page 89 Page Gun Crime Offences
800 Gun Crime Offences are any offence where a firearm has been used or 700 the possession of a firearm with intent. 600 629 Gun Crime Offences remained constant between Q1 2014/15 and Q3 500 464 2015/16 averaging 465 offences each quarter. However, Q1 2016/17 400 saw the first significant rise, which continued in the following quarters. 300 200 Hundreds of officers work every day to tackle the threat from gangs under the Trident command and other units including local officers. 100 They focus on those causing the most harm in order to do the most to 0 protect London. Operational activity is focused on reducing shootings and taking weapons and dangerous offenders off the streets through reactive and proactive investigations. Police and partners’ work on prevention and diversion is vital - reducing availability of weapons,
creating pathways away from violence, engaging with young people
Q1 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2017/18 and building trust with communities. 12 A better Police Service for London Page 90 Page
13 Public Perception of the police
Driver areas Rolling 12 months data per point 100%
90% 78% 80% 76% 78% 74% 76% 74% 70% 72% 70% 69% 68% 60%
50% 50% 45%
% % Agree 44% 40%
32%
30% 91 Page The confidence intervals associated with this data are approximately 0.9 percentage points per point. 20% Relied on to be there Fair treatment Dealing issues Listen to concerns
10% Informed local Contact SNT/ward officer Good job
0%
Q1 14-15 Q1 14-15 Q2 14-15 Q3 14-15 Q4 15-16 Q1 15-16 Q2 15-16 Q3 15-16 Q4 16-17 Q1 16-17 Q2 16-17 Q3 16-17 Q4 17-18 Q1
Source: Public Attitude Survey (PAS) When comparing twelve months to Q1 17-18 to R12 to Q1 16-17, there have been notable increases in the proportion of respondents feeling the police treat everyone fairly (+3%), deal with the things that matter (+3%) and feeling informed about local policing (+2%). Smaller increases are also seen for feeling the police can be relied on to be there when needed and listen to the concerns of local people. The proportion feeling the police do a good job in the local area has remained stable, while a decrease is seen in those saying they know how to contact their local SNT/Ward Officer (-3%).
The lowest performing aspects within the public attitude survey measures above are people knowing how to contact their local police (just 32%) and feeling informed (44%). The latter of these has seen a slight reduction (-2%) over the last year yet local information has seen an increase (+2%). It is hoped that the Q1 launch of the police local web pages and Ward twitter accounts will help address this. 14 Victim Satisfaction
Overall Satisfaction and satisfaction within service areas Discrete Quarter per point 100% 93% 90% 89% 90% 87% 80% 79% 75% 72% 73% 70% 69% 65% 60% The confidence intervals associated with this data are approximately 0.7 percentage points per data point 50% Page 92 Page
% Satisfied % 40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Source: User-
Satisfaction Survey
Q1 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2016/17 Q3 Q2 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q4 2017/18 Q1 Ease of Contact Police Actions Follow Up Treatment Overall Satisfaction
Victim Satisfaction has declined across the Metropolitan Police area by 3.75% over the last twelve months and is now at the lowest levels since FY 2014/15.
The Met has taken action to address the decline in victim satisfaction, through a reinforced Total Victim Care (TVC) initiative with Commander Jerome as strategic lead and working with London’s Victim Commissioner Claire Waxman. Earlier in the year all borough commanders were provided with a toolkit focusing on TVC, Codes of Practice for the Victims of Crime (VCOP) compliance and improvement including an action plan with evidenced based actions that directly improve the victim experience. The Met used operational focus groups to engage and listen to what they need to deliver a quality victim service.
Joint enterprise workshops took place with MOPAC including raising awareness of restorative justice and Victim Support Services. Over the coming months better linkages with the Met’s vulnerability/ safeguarding team will be built at a strategic, tactical and operational level for TVC. A Business case is being submitted for a full time TVC officer integrated with MOPAC working to the agenda of the MPS Commissioner and the Victims Commissioner for London. The Met will also continue to upskill officers and drive through national good practice and introduce additional support for victims with protected characteristics. 15 Satisfaction and Public Voice - Inequalities
The table compares positive or negative Agree the differences per group Feels well Agree the police Agree the police are against the overall Police do a informed about listen to the police treat response to each question. dealing with Overall good job in the local police concerns of local everyone A positive or negative the things that figure of above +/-5% is Satisfaction local area activities over the people fairly matter to this considered significant. (Good job) last 12 months (Listen to (Fair community (Informed local) concerns) treatment) (Dealing issues)
MPS Average 75.3% 68.6% 43.7% 76.0% 78.3% 73.6% White 3.0% -0.1% 2.3% -0.8% -0.3% -1.3% British White Other 3.6% 6.2% -4.9% 4.8% 6.4% 6.0%
Ethnicity Black -3.9% -6.3% -1.1% -5.9% -11.1% -5.5% Asian -3.0% -0.9% 0.8% 0.7% 2.2% 0.5% Mixed -4.4% -13.5% 3.7% -7.1% -7.8% -6.9% Other 0.1% 4.9% -0.4% 7.4% 5.0% 6.3%
Page 93 Page ethnicity LGB -0.7% -2.3% 0.0% -6.1% -6.4% -9.3% LGB Not LGB 0.5% 0.1% -0.1% 0.2% 0.1% 0.2% 16-24 -1.2% -0.6% -5.9% -2.3% -1.8% -3.2% 25-34 -3.2% 2.9% -4.7% -0.5% 1.5% 0.7% 35-44 -1.7% 1.2% 2.0% 0.4% -0.4% 1.7% Age 45-54 0.9% -2.6% 2.6% -2.3% -2.4% -3.2% 55-64 2.4% -5.9% 2.0% 0.4% -2.0% -0.8% 65 years + 10.7% 2.0% 6.3% 5.0% 4.0% 4.0% Disability -3.1% -3.1% -2.8% 1.0% -0.6% -2.3% Disability No disability 0.6% 0.3% 0.3% 0.8% 0.1% 0.3%
Male -0.5% 0.8% 1.8% -0.4% -0.2% -0.5% Sex Female 1.0% -0.8% -1.7% 0.5% 0.2% 0.5% Source: Public Attitude Survey and User Satisfaction Survey Q1 17-18. Results for White Other and Other Ethnicity tend to be higher than the MPS average for measures, whereas results for Black or Mixed respondents tend to be below the MPS average (particularly for fair treatment). Black or mixed respondents are also less likely to feel police do a good job. LGBT respondents are less likely to agree the police treat everyone fairly, listen to concerns, or are dealing with the things that matter. Also, older respondents record a higher satisfaction than all other groups and feel more informed than other age groups. 16 Workforce – Overview & Diversity MPS Workforce Makeup Long Term Trend Police Officer Strength 8% 7% 6% 6% Police Officers 4% 3% 3% 3% 20% 20% 35,000 31,944 23% 21% 30,712 31,720 30,719 30,000 25,000
FTEs 20,000 66% 68% 71% 71% 15,000 10,000
Q1 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q12016/17 Q1 2017/18 5,000 MPS Special Constabulory Police Community Support Officer 0 Police 94 Page Staff Police Officer Q1 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q1 2017/18 Whilst we retain a strategic ambition of 32,000 police officers this was last achieved in 2012. Officer numbers are currently under that which was budgeted for at the start of the year, primarily due to slower than anticipated recruitment. The focus has remained on reducing back office expenditure to ensure that officer numbers can be kept as high as possible. The share of BAME and female officers has steadily increased over the past year, thanks to a concerted effort from the Met to be an organisation representative of the city it polices. Long Term Trend BAME Police Officer Strength Long Term Trend Female Police Officer Strength BAME Police Officers Female Police Officers 5,000 16% 4,160 10,000 30% 4,141 14% 8,118 14% 9,000 7,701 8,163 8,059 4,000 3,730 26% 25% 3,369 12% 8,000 25% 7,000 11% 10% 20% 3,000 6,000
8% FTEs 5,000 15% FTEs 2,000 6% 4,000 3,000 10% 4% 1,000 2,000 5% 2% 1,000 0 0% 0 0% Q1 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q1 2017/18 Q1 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q1 2017/18
Number of BAME Police Officers % of total Police Officers Number of Female Police Officers % of total Police Officers
The number of female and BAME officers have both increased over the last 5 years. The proportion of female and BAME officer recruits has also increased. 17 Workforce – Overview & Diversity Long term trend - Police Staff strength
Female Police Staff 14,000 Police Staff 6,575 11,802 7,000 6,188 60.0% 12,000 11,068 6,000 5,295 56.0% 50.0% 9,329 55.7% 10,000 5,000 4,756 8,500 40.0%
8,000 4,000 FTEs
FTEs 30.0% 6,000 3,000 20.0% 4,000 2,000 1,000 10.0% 2,000 0 0.0% 0 Q1 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q1 2017/18 Q1 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q1 2017/18 Female Police Staff % of total Police Staff Page 95 Page
BAME Police Staff 3,500 2,868 30.0% Police staff numbers (Excludes PCSOs) have reduced since 2014/15 by 28% 2,770 as of Q1 2017/18. In consequence, BAME and Female staff numbers have 3,000 24.3% 25.0% also reduced. However as a proportion, female staff consistently represent 2,500 2,318 24.6% 2,095 20.0% 56% of the total FTE staff cohort, and BAME approximately one in four 2,000 members of police staff.
FTEs 15.0% 1,500 10.0% 1,000 500 5.0% 0 0.0% Q1 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q1 2017/18 BAME Police Staff % of total Police Staff
18 Workforce – Dedicated Ward Officers (DWO)
By December 2017, the Met aims for each of DWOs remaining to be allocated within each borough the 629 wards in London to have at least two Dedicated Ward Officers (DWOs). The map below shows that as of the end of Q1 2017 it has achieved this coverage in 21 of the 32 boroughs. In due course MOPAC will report on the level of abstractions of DWOs. This will allow us to ensure these officers are not being abstracted from their duties within their local area, apart from exceptional events.
Page 96 Page Dec 17 Current Month Target DWOs at Diff DWOs June 17 June 2017 1,258 1,171 -87
Target expected to be achieved by December 2017
Target achieved
19 Public Complaints Number of complaints and cases per financial year 2014/15 to Q1 2017/18 14,000 14,000 12,000 12,000 10,000 10,000 8,000 6,814 8,000 6,000 5833 6,000 4,000 4,000
2,000 2,000 NumberofCases
NumberofAllegations 12,513 11,948 10,802 2,141
0 0
2014/15 2015/16 2016/17
Allegations Cases 2017/18Q1 to Page 97 Page The number of complaint cases recorded decreased over the last three years despite the definition of a complaint being broadened in 2012/13. A complaint case may have one or more allegations attached to it.
Each allegation is recorded against one of 27 allegation categories. The most common allegation was recorded under the ‘other neglect or failure in duty’, followed by ‘incivility’. The first category accounted for 36% of all the allegations recorded in 2016/17; a similar proportion to previous years.
At the end of 2016/17, when national figures were last available, the Met was ranked 15th out of 44 forces. The Met receives approximately 13 complaint cases per 100 employees against a national average of 28 per 100.
The Policing and Crime Act 2017 provides an explicit duty for local policing bodies to hold to account the MPS Commissioner in regard to the handling of public complaints. MOPAC are now responsible for developing an oversight framework to fulfil that enhanced statutory responsibility. The legislative reforms are seeking to establish a greater degree of integrity and transparency in the management of complaints. Furthermore, they are designed to inspire an increased level of public confidence in the ability of the Met to deal with complaints in a fair and efficient manner.
The Home Office have determined that the reforms to the police complaints will take effect from Summer 2018. MOPAC and the MPS have already commenced working in collaboration to deliver a complaints management framework that will be legally compliant and support an appropriate oversight and inspection infrastructure. The new Complaints Reform Working Group – a joint MOPAC & MPS group – is intended to provide a forum for MOPAC and MPS to ensure work is delivered effectively.
20 A better Criminal Justice Service for London Page 98 Page
As part of continual improvement of the quality of our reporting MOPAC are looking at wider criminal justice measures for potential future inclusion.
21 A better Criminal Justice Service for London
The key objectives of the Police and Crime Plan 2017-21 sets out plans to actively monitor a Better service for victims. Part of this monitoring involves ensuring the MPS complies with the Victim’s Code of Practice (VCOP) and how well victims are kept informed. Below shows the proportion of Victims Updated of VCOP Applicable Offences.
60,000 VCOP* Applicable Offences **and Percentage of Victims Updated 90%
80% 50,000 80% 65% 70%
40,000 60%
50% 30,000 40%
Page 99 Page 20,000 30%
20% 10,000
10%
#N/A
45,614 53,904 39,828 42,541 44,157 45,498 43,268 43,877 46,792 45,720 44,192 41,317 47,224 44,322 48,540 49,062 49,205 46,287 45,855 49,657 50,428 49,120 46,278 44,671 46,678 51,854 51,036 53,884 50,751 50,541 51,423 48,931 50,631 47,172 46,475 54,448 50,226 54,513
0 0%
Jul-14 Jul-15 Jul-16
Jan-17 Jan-15 Jan-16
Jun-14 Jun-15 Jun-16 Jun-17
Oct-14 Oct-15 Oct-16
Apr-14 Apr-15 Apr-16 Apr-17
Sep-14 Feb-15 Sep-15 Feb-16 Sep-16 Feb-17
Dec-15 Dec-14 Dec-16
Aug-14 Aug-15 Aug-16
Nov-14 Nov-15 Nov-16
Mar-15 Mar-16 Mar-17
May-14 May-15 May-16 May-17
• Victim Code of Practice ** September 2014 Data not available Number of VCOP Applicable Offences Regular Updates
The proportion of victims updated of VCOP Applicable Offences gradually reduced over time (between April 2014 to June 2017). Currently (June 2017), only 65% of victims are updated, compared to 80% in April 2014. During that period the number of VCOP Applicable Offences increased from 39,828 in April 2014 to 54,513 in June 2017.
22 A better Criminal Justice Service for London
The key objectives of the Police and Crime Plan 2017-21 sets out plans to actively monitor a Better service for victims. Part of this monitoring involves ensuring the MPS complies with the Victim’s Code of Practice (VCOP) and how well victims are kept informed. Below shows the proportion of victims informed of Suspect Arrested of VCOP Applicable Offences.
Victims informed of Suspect Arrested** 60,000 90%
80% 50,000 80% 69% 70% Page 100 Page 40,000 60%
50% 30,000 40%
20,000 30%
20% 10,000
10%
#N/A
42,541 44,192 45,855 39,828 44,157 45,498 43,268 43,877 46,792 45,720 41,317 47,224 44,322 48,540 49,062 49,205 46,287 49,657 50,428 49,120 46,278 44,671 46,678 45,614 51,854 51,036 53,884 50,751 50,541 51,423 48,931 50,631 47,172 46,475 54,448 50,226 53,904 54,513
0 0%
Jun-14 Jun-15 Jun-16 Jun-17
Oct-14 Oct-15 Oct-16
Apr-14 Apr-15 Apr-16 Apr-17
Feb-15 Feb-16 Feb-17
Dec-14 Dec-15 Dec-16
Aug-14 Aug-15 Aug-16 ** September 2014 Data not available Number of VCOP Applicable Offences Informed of Suspect Arrested
The proportion of victims informed about whether the suspect has been arrested has reduced from 80% in April 2014 to 69% in June 2017. During that period the number of VCOP applicable offences increased .
23 A better Criminal Justice Service for London
The key objectives of the Police and Crime Plan 2017-21 sets out plans to actively monitor a Better service for victims. Part of this monitoring involves ensuring the MPS complies with the Victim’s Code of Practice (VCOP) and how well victims are kept informed. Below shows the proportion of victims informed of Suspect Released of VCOP Applicable Offences.
60,000 Victims informed of Suspect Released** 80%
71% 72% 70% 50,000
60%
40,000 50%
30,000 40% Page 101 Page 30% 20,000
20%
10,000
10%
#N/A
48,540 49,120 53,884 46,475 39,828 42,541 44,157 45,498 43,268 43,877 46,792 45,720 44,192 41,317 47,224 44,322 49,062 49,205 46,287 45,855 49,657 50,428 46,278 44,671 46,678 45,614 51,854 51,036 50,751 50,541 51,423 48,931 50,631 47,172 54,448 50,226 53,904 54,513
0 0%
Jun-14 Jun-15 Jun-16 Jun-17
Oct-16 Oct-14 Oct-15
Apr-14 Apr-15 Apr-16 Apr-17
Feb-15 Feb-16 Feb-17
Dec-14 Dec-15 Dec-16
Aug-14 Aug-15 Aug-16
** September 2014 Data not available Number of VCOP Applicable Offences Informed of Suspect Released
The proportion of victims informed of when a suspect has been released has remained relatively constant at approximately 71%, while the number of VCOP Applicable Offences increased during that same period.
24 Page 102 Page Keeping children and young people safe
25 Keeping children and young people safe
The number of youth victims of knife crime with injury was higher during the last Knife crime - Victims under 25 financial year than the previous 3, with the initial uptick evident in Q1 2016/17. Q1 700 565 2017/18 has seen 30 more victims than Q1 2016/17. Knife crime is a top priority for 600 the Met. This year, it reinforced Operation Sceptre with two units deployed across 500 426 520 London on late turn 7 days a week. Targeted weeks of action are running including 400 391 weapon sweeps, knife hotspot patrols, habitual knife offender targeting and Stop and 300 Search. Test purchase operations are also taking place, with Police cadets and trading 200 standards to ensure that retailers are compliant around the sale of knifes to under 100 18s. 0 The Met is increasing the number of its Safer Schools Officers and has stepped up
engagement work across the education sector.
Q1 14/15 Q1 14/15 Q2 14/15 Q3 14/15 Q4 15/16 Q1 15/16 Q2 15/16 Q3 15/16 Q4 16/17 Q1 16/17 Q2 16/17 Q3 16/17 Q4 17/18 Q1 There is an important role for all partners in prevention and diversion. The Mayor has Knife Crime Injury Victims 1-24 Knife Crime Injury Victims Not DA 1-24 published a comprehensive Knife Crime Strategy and is convening partners across the capital in efforts to tackle the issue through the London Crime Reduction Board. Both the Mayor and the Met are encouraging people in positions of influence, peers,
Page 103 Page parents, role models, community leaders, to drive the message and help support a long-term change in behaviour. Number of Missing Children reported More than 8,000 children are on a protection plan in London at any one time, and at 10,000 risk of violence and abuse. More than 5000 children go missing every quarter. Many 9,000 of these children are vulnerable to gangs and gang violence and radicalisation. 8,000 7,902 7,000 6,000 … The Met is clear that safeguarding children, and vulnerable people, is the 5,000 responsibility of every single police officer and work is taking place to embed our 4,000 safeguarding services in neighbourhood policing –as these officers are best placed to 3,000 offer victims the appropriate level of support and investigate at the earliest 2,000 1,000 opportunity. This structure is being tested through the BCU pathfinders and longer - term, the Met’s ambition is to invest more resources in this area with more officers across London protecting vulnerable members of the community.
The Met is working closely with MOPAC and partners to improve child protection
practice across London, learning from HMIC’s Child Protection Inspection
Q2 2016/17 Q2 Q2 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2017/18 Q1 Q1 2014/15 recommendations which are based findings of a report undertaken between The above chart totals missing and absent children. A person is “absent” when they are not at a February to May 2016. The next issue of this quarterly report will expand on this place where they are expected or required to be and there is no apparent risk. section.
26 Page 104 Page Tackling Violence against Women and Girls
27 Violence Against Women and Girls
Domestic Abuse Total Sexual Offences 25,000 10,000 19,989 20,000 8,000 15,000 15,769 6,000 4,871 10,000 4,000 3,333 5,000 2,000
- -
Q2 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 Q1 Q1 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2017/18
Q3 2016/17 Q3 Q1 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2017/18
Domestic 105 Page Abuse: Sexual Offences: In Q1 2017/18 the level of recorded domestic abuse is 5% higher than Q1 In Q1 of 2017/18 the level of recorded sexual offences is 10% higher than Q1 2016/17. Between April and June 2017 there were 19,989 recorded domestic 2016/17. Between April and June 2017 there were 4,871 recorded sexual offences abuse offences across London. This is 976 more offences than in Q1 2016/17. across London. This is 461 more offences than in Q1 2016/17.
This category includes high harm crimes and is specifically targeted in the Mayor’s Police and Crime Plan because of the disproportionate impact of the crimes on this group. The Police and Crime Plan commits to refreshing London’s Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy, working closely with the VAWG sector. This will be published in the coming weeks.
We know that domestic abuse and sexual offences are both significantly underreported, which makes it difficult to fully understand the true scale of the problem in London. Some of the recent increase in recent periods may be accounted for by an increase in reporting rather than an increase in a number of offences. MOPAC and the Met encourage this trend so that offenders can be bought to justice. Specialist training in Domestic Abuse is now provided to all frontline officers and the rollout of Body Worn Video camera to officers will support the capture of evidence and increase effectiveness in bringing offenders to justice
28 Violence Against Women and Girls Honour Based Violence Forced Marriage 120 30 100 101 25
80 79 20 60 15 40 10 20 5 6 0 0 0
Page 106 Page
Q1 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2017/18
Q1 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q4 Q1 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2014/15 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q1 2017/18
Female Genital Mutilation, Forced marriage, Honour Based Violence
So-called Honour based violence (HBV) offences are identified via the use of flagging on the MPS crime recording system. This allows any offence believed to be linked to honour based practices to be flagged and recorded irrespective of the crime classification. As of end of March 2017 there were 326 recorded HBV offences compared to 442 in the preceding year. Forced marriage offences have increased over the last few years, with the recorded levels in 2016/17 of 111 offences. This compares to a similar level of 112 in 2015/16. Of these harmful practices, Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is the least prevalent in terms of recorded crime data. FGM is identified on the crime system using a flag and in the last year there were only 21 offences flagged as FGM related.
Under-reporting is a big challenge and the Met is working with partners and communities to try and address this, and to support information sharing with third sector and health organisations
29 Standing together against extremism, hatred and intolerance Page 107 Page
30 Hate Crime Following international or UK centric events such as a terrorist attacks there have been increases in the number of Hate Crime Offences. Examples include increases following the EU referendum and the terrorist attacks in the London Bridge area. Racist Hate Crime There has been an overall increase in recorded Racist and Religious Hate Crime. The month following the EU referendum saw the largest recorded level of racist and 6000 religious hate crime since 2014/15 with a total of 2,141 crimes recorded in July 5000 2016. This was also seen across England and Wales and well publicised across media. 4318 Following the terrorist attacks in the London Bridge area in June 2017, there was an 4000 increase in the number of these offences recorded by the MPS – 1,908 compared to 3000 1,440 in the preceding month. 2678 2000 The majority of the victims of racist hate crime are from the Black and Asian 1000 communities. Incidents and offences are up: more people are reporting, which helps the Met identify where and when hate crime is taking place and who the repeat
0 108 Page offenders are. The Met introduced Hate Crime Liaison officers in October 2016 to every London borough. It has specially trained investigators who deal with hate crime and is working to increase reporting, with online reporting now available and
with a number of third party reporting sites so that victims who would otherwise
Q4 2016/17 Q4 Q1 2014/15 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2017/18 Q1 feel unable to approach police direct can report crime to non-police organisations.
Islamophobic Hate Crime Anti-Semitic Hate Crime 700 500 600 586 400 500 400 300
300 200 200 124 100 127 100 57
0 0
Q3 2015/16 Q3 Q1 2014/15 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2017/18 Q1
Q4 2014/15 Q4 2016/17 Q1 Q1 2014/15 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2015/16 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2017/18 Q1 Islamophobic Hate Crime has increased over time with spikes at various points linked to specific incidents, such as in November/December 2015 after the Paris attack; in March 2017 following the Westminster attack and in May/June 2017 following Manchester and London Bridge attacks. Note: A crime can have more than one hate flag attached to it. Adding up all the hate crime categories may result in multiple counting of a single offence and will not equal a Hate Crime total. 31 Hate Crime
Disability Hate Crime MOPAC and MPS are taking a zero-tolerance approach to hate crime, including abuse due 700 to sexual orientation or disability. When a person is targeted for crime and abuse simply 600 because of who they are, this has a knock-on impact on a much wider community. 500 The long term trend in disability hate crime indicates that the recorded crime increased. 400 sexual orientation and transgender hate crime has increased over a long term trend with 300 regular fluctuations, with spikes occurring in July 2016 for both. 200 100 108 In February 2016 the MPS and community partners launched the ‘Disability Hate Crime 30 Matters’ initiative, providing briefings to frontline officers to ensure disability hate crime 0 is recognised, properly recorded, and gets the response it requires. This saw a far higher number of disability hate crime reports captured than would previously have been the
case.
Q1 2014/15 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2017/18 Q1 Page 109 Page
Transgender Hate Crime Sexual Orientation Hate Crime
700 700 600 600 550 500 500 400 400 300 300 392 200 200 100 29 100 51
0 0
Q4 2015/16 Q4 2014/15 Q1 2014/15 Q2 Q1 2014/15 Q1 2014/15 Q2 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2016/17 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2017/18 Q1 2014/15 Q3 2014/15 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2017/18 Q1
Note: A crime can have more than one hate flag attached to it. Adding up all the hate crime categories may result in multiple counting of a single offence and will not equal a Hate Crime total. 32 Extremism
Total Counter Terrorism Arrests 80 As might be expected given the events of Quarter 1, the level of 70 73 arrests increased to its highest level in the three months to June 60 2017. The response to the terrorists incidents required an enormous amount of officers in the immediate aftermath and in 50 terms of investigating capacity, across the whole organisation: not 40 37 just on counter-terrorism police but also neighbourhood officers 30 and all Met officers and staff. The Met remains on a heightened 20 state of readiness and is continually reviewing security 10 arrangements to reflect the threat we are facing. This also requires 0 vigilance from everyone to report anything suspicious to the police at the earliest possible opportunity
Page 110 Page
Q4 Q4 2014/15 Q1 2015/16 Q2 2015/16 Q3 2015/16 Q4 2015/16 Q1 2016/17 Q2 2016/17 Q3 2016/17 Q4 2016/17 Q1 2017/18
Data only available from Q42014/15. Arrests by Metropolitan Police Counter Terrorism Command officers. These includes arrests they have made in London and also outside the Capital.
33 Finance Page 111 Page
34 Finances at a glance Q1 2017/18 Gross Revenue Expenditure
Forecasted Total 17/18 Net Full Year Gross Budget: £3,285m Revenue variance: Full Year Gross Forecast: £3,256m Variance: -£29m Total Q1 Variance: -£32.2m
Further detail and commentary
Page 112 Page on subsequent slides.
Capital Expenditure Reserve Balance Full Year Budget (£m) Full Year Forecast (£m) General reserves Earmarked Reserves Net Transfer (to)/from Reserves
£16.0 Fleet Services £31m (11%) Full Year Budget: £366m £360m £81.5 Full Year Forecast: £268m National Counter Variance: -£98m £260m £372.9 Terrorism Policing Head £29m (10%) £333.9 Quarters (NCTPHQ) £275.4 £250.4 £160m £192.5
Digital Policing £123m (46%) £60m £46.4 £46.4 £46.4 £46.4 £46.4
-£57.7 -£40m -£92.8 Property Services £85m (32%) - £122.7 -£140m 2013/14 2014/15 2015/16 2016/17 2017/18* £0m £50m £100m £150m £200m * Forecast 35 Revenue Position at Q1 17/18
Full Year Police Officer Pay: Based on the current Q1 17/18 Budget To Actual to Variance to Date Full Year Forecast Variance (£m) recruitment pipeline and the latest HR workforce Date (£m) Date (£m) (£m) Budget (£m) (£m) modelling data the police pay expenditure forecast is a £23.3m underspend at the end of Police Officer Pay 452.1 445.0 -7.1 1,805.0 1,781.6 -23.3 the year. This underspend will be transferred to Police Staff Pay 117.1 107.3 -9.8 479.4 448.7 -30.7 reserves in order to support officer recruitment plans in future years; subject to finalising the PCSO Pay 13.8 14.0 0.2 53.7 54.6 0.9 costs and funding arrangements for the 1% Total Pay 583.0 566.3 -16.7 2,338.1 2,284.9 -53.2 bonus awarded to Police Officer in 2017 and 2018. Police Officer Overtime 20.8 30.2 9.4 79.0 101.8 22.8 Police Staff Overtime 5.1 6.6 1.5 20.1 24.3 4.2 Police Staff Pay: The forecast outturn is for a £30.7m underspend, offset to some extent by PCSO Overtime 0.1 0.1 0.0 0.2 0.2 0.0 forecast overspends on overtime and other Total Overtime 26.0 36.9 10.9 99.3 126.3 27.0 costs. Whilst noting recruitment is underway, this underspend is significant and police staff pay TOTAL PAY & OVERTIME 609.0 603.2 -5.8 2,437.4 2,411.2 -26.2 is being reviewed in the forthcoming budget Employee 113 Page Related Expenditure 5.0 6.4 1.4 21.9 21.1 -0.8 process to assess any potential permanent savings. Premises Costs 45.0 42.8 -2.2 173.9 171.8 -2.1 Transport Costs 16.8 16.3 -0.5 65.4 65.6 0.2 Total Overtime: At the end of June the Police Officer and Police Staff overtime budgets were Supplies & Services 121.9 105.6 -16.3 509.7 509.6 -0.1 overspent by £10.9m in total and the full year TOTAL RUNNING EXPENSES 188.7 171.1 -17.6 770.9 768.1 -2.8 forecast at this point is for a £27.0m overspend. Some of this spend compensates for Capital Financing Costs 24.4 24.4 0.0 41.9 41.9 0.0 vacancies in the pay lines above; £14.1m relates Discretionary Pension Costs 8.6 8.5 -0.1 34.4 34.5 0.1 to areas funded by Counter Terrorism and other grants, and additional grant is being sought in TOTAL EXPENDITURE 830.7 807.2 -23.5 3,284.6 3,255.7 -28.9 these areas to recognise the costs of recent Other Income -64.1 -63.3 0.8 -256.6 -262.5 -5.9 incidents.
Specific Grants -106.4 -105.9 0.5 -431.7 -430.8 0.9 Running Costs: Running costs are forecast to be Transfer to/(from) reserves -18.0 -16.2 1.8 -92.8 -91.1 1.7 broadly on budget, although it is too early in the financial year to draw definitive conclusions. The TOTAL NET EXPENDITURE 642.2 621.8 -20.4 2,503.5 2,471.3 -32.2 year-to-date running costs are underspent by Funding (General Grant & £17.6m, mainly due to budget profiling issues -596.3 -596.9 -0.6 -2,503.5 -2,503.5 0.0 Precept) and delays in grants to services commissioned OVERALL MPS & MOPAC Total 45.9 24.9 -21.0 0.0 -32.2 -32.2 from third parties. 36 Revenue supporting information Police officer pay & overtime Police overtime Police staff pay & overtime
Officer pay year-to date £7.1m underspend, full year Year To Current Annual Annual Police staff pay year-to date £9.8m underspend, forecast of £23.3m underspend and police overtime Date Actual Full Year Forecast Variance £30.7m full year forecast underspend and staff Business Group £m Budget £m £m year to date £9.4m overspend and full year variance £m overtime year-to date £1.5m overspend, £4.2m at £22.8m forecast overspend. Police officer pay Territorial Policing 7.5 19.8 24.2 4.3 Police staff pay Specialist Crime & Operations 11.4 32.8 39.0 6.2 Year To Current Annual Annual Year To Current Annual Annual Date Actual Full Year Forecast Variance Specialist Operations 11.0 25.5 37.7 12.2 Business Group Date Actual Full Year Forecast Variance £m Budget £m £m Business Group Met HQ (excl. DP) 0.2 0.7 0.7 0.0 £m Budget £m £m £m £m Digital Policing 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 Territorial Policing 19.2 91.4 78.6 -12.7 Territorial Policing 264.1 1,050.1 1,049.6 -0.4 Centrally Held 0.1 0.1 0.3 0.2 Specialist Crime & Operations 40.8 173.4 162.7 -10.7 Specialist Crime & Operations 107.7 424.3 422.5 -1.7 Total Police Officer Overtime 30.2 79.0 101.8 22.8 Specialist Operations 11.8 52.7 52.7 0.0 Specialist Operations 57.8 233.9 234.7 0.8 Met HQ (excl. DP) 29.5 126.0 121.1 -4.8 Digital Policing 3.4 16.3 15.2 -1.1 Met HQ (excl. DP) 12.2 49.0 51.3 2.3 As at the end of June the Police Overtime budget was Centrally Held 0.5 10.8 10.0 -0.8 Digital Policing 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.1 overspent by £9.3m and the full year forecast at the MOPAC 1.9 9.0 8.5 -0.5 Centrally Held 114 Page 3.1 47.7 23.3 -24.5 end of Q1 is for a £22.8m overspend. Total Police Staff Pay 107.3 479.4 448.7 -30.7 Grand Total 445.0 1,805.0 1,781.6 -23.3 The major driver for the overspend is due to the With the proposed transfer of the £23.3m internally response and investigations following the recent four The majority of police staff pay underspend in funded police pay underspend to reserves being terrorist incidents in London and Manchester and Territorial Policing is due to vacancies within Criminal approved, the updated pay forecast position would be additional costs incurred through investigations due to Justice, Met Detention and in the Designated broadly on budget with the overall MOPAC Group Grenfell Fire. The other main driver for the overtime Detention Officers (DDOs). There is also an underspend underspend reducing to £8.9m. overspend is within Met Detention Custody. As the within the Forensic Health Nurses, and in Met recruitment campaign is underway, the pressure on Prosecutions where the vacant posts are currently Work continues to fill existing vacancies through the additional overtime is expected to reduce. being filled. The underspend is partly offset through Police Officer Postings Panel, therefore current vacancy use of expenditure on Forensic Medical Officers, who levels are expected to reduce in 2017/18. are used to provide cover for the nurse vacancies, and PCSO pay police officer overtime. Year-to date £0.2m overspend, £0.9m full year forecast overspend The underspend in SC&O is predominantly due to high turnover of staff coupled with delays in recruitment. At the end of June there were more than the affordable number of PCSOs in posts funded from The police staff overtime budget is forecast to core grant and precept and vacancies in those posts overspend by £4.2m at year end with the majority of funded by 3rd parties. the overspend due to vacancies in DDO posts and the need for the existing staff to work overtime to cover shifts. It is anticipated that the DDO recruitment campaigns will yield sufficient numbers to cover these vacant posts and therefore remove the pressure on overtime budgets.
37 Revenue supporting information Achievement against savings target Running costs Year-to date £17.6m underspend, £2.8m full year During the 2017/18 planning process the MPS were required to deliver a net saving of £75m. Within forecast underspend this net saving figures was the growth for additional overtime, leaving a total of £82.1m savings to be Running costs are forecast to be broadly on delivered in the current financial year. MPS are on track to deliver £66m of that saving and are working budget, although it is too early in the financial on delivery of a further £11m where some timing issues have been identified. This leaves £5.1m with a year to draw definitive conclusions. high risk of non-delivery – mainly within Specialist Crime and Operations (SC&O). Both of these areas will be tested over the summer through the budget process. The 2017/18 savings are analysed in the The year-to-date running costs are underspent by table below. £17.6m, mainly due to budget profiling issues. Planned Saving Forecast Saving Variation £m Running costs for SO are showing a forecast £m £m £5.6m underspend, however expenditure relating to the recent terrorist incidents and Operation Savings that are forecast to be delivered in full (high Roset (uplift in policing to address terrorist -61.3 -61.3 0.0 incidents) is still being clarified and it is very likely confidence of delivery of savings) that the underspend will reduce with a revised Savings with timing delivery problems (confidence in forecast next period. -15.7 -4.7 11.0 delivery of savings but with delays) Page 115 Page
Income Savings with structural delivery problems -5.1 0.0 5.1 Year-to date £0.8m under-recovery, £5.9m full year forecast over-recovery Total - MPS Savings 2017/18 -82.1 -65.9 16.1
There will be an additional drawdown from the Police Property Activity Fund (PPAF) to support 3rd Party organisations in the delivery of the PCP and additional income of £3.3m within Criminal Justice / Traffic Unit from delivering driver awareness courses, recovery of courts costs and provision of information to third parties for civil action. We also anticipate an additional £1.6m income from the College of Policing for the Direct Entry Superintendent course. PCSO vacancies in funded posts are likely to reduce income by £1.3m.
38 Capital Position at Q1 17/18 At the start of 2017/18 the Mayor approved a capital Full Year Full Year Actual to Variance programme that provided for £366.2m of expenditure. This MPS (£m) Full Year Projection Forecast Budget (£m) Date (£m) (£m) will be funded from a combination of capital receipts, grants (£m) and other contributions. Transforming MPS Estate 159.3 12.5 85.3 -74 Capital expenditure for the year is forecast at £268m with a Property full year variance projected at an underspend of £98.2m Over Programming - Property Services -11.4 0 0 11.4 Services Total Property Services 147.9 12.5 85.3 -62.6 Capital Programme adjustment plans: • NCTPHQ CT Policing Change Portfolio 62 0.2 28.5 -33.5 Property Services - Property services is forecasting a full year variance of -42% given longer lead in times for large Creating Business Support function of scale projects and dependencies of key decisions on the 0.5 0 0.5 0 the future outcome of the public access consultation and the
Page 116 Page evaluation of the pathfinder sites. The proposal is to re- Enhance Digital Policing for 2020 9.8 4 30.5 20.7 profile the approved capital plan for 2017/18 from Improving Public Access and first £159.3m to £85.3m, and to re-profile the capital receipts 4.3 0.9 2.9 -1.4 contact budget for 2017/18 from £71m to £32m Optimising Response 13.1 1 9.8 -3.3 • Digital Policing - Digital policing spend at the end of Q1 is £12.7m with major spend linked to the mobility rollout Reinforcing HQ, Improving Information 4.6 0.1 1.2 -3.4 and digital policing transformation, including the networks Management Digital Policing tower and data centre migration. Digital policing is Smarter Working 58.9 3.9 53.7 -5.2 forecasting to spend to budget for the full year. The major rollout of laptops under the mobility project commences Transforming investigation and 36.8 1.1 36.4 -0.4 from August, in-vehicle mobile applications from June, and prosecution further major network installations are planned for the Strengthening Local Policing 2 0.1 0.6 -1.4 second half of the year. DP Core/Other 20 1.4 6.9 -13.1 • Fleet Services - Fleet has spent £1.6m to date, with a CT Policing Change Portfolio 1.4 0.2 3 1.6 back-end loaded profile of vehicle delivery for this year, and is forecasting a minor variance of -7% for the full Over Programming – Digital Policing -28.6 0 -22.7 5.9 year. Fleet has proposed a re-profile of the capital plan Total Digital Policing 122.8 12.7 122.8 0 with a reduction from £33.5m to £31.4m in this financial year and an increase from £32.8m to £34.4m in 2018/19. Delivering maximum commercial 28.8 1.9 26.7 -2.1 Fleet efficiency - Fleet • NCTPHQ - NCTPHQ which is overseen through national structures has rescaled the Counter Terrorism capital plan Strengthening our Armed Policing 4.7 -0.3 4.7 0 pending national discussions and is forecasting a full year Capability variance of -54%. NCTPHQ has proposed a reduction in its Total Fleet Services 33.5 1.6 31.4 -2.1 approved capital plan from £62m to £28.5m Total Capital Expenditure 366.2 27.0 268 -98.2 39 Capital Capital expenditure trend (£m) Quarterly (£m)
£450m £60m £58m £400m £50m £350m £47m
£300m £268m £40m £36m £238m £36m £250m £199m £30m £27m £200m £177m £150m £150m £20m £100m £10m £50m £0m £0m 13/14 * 14/15 * 15/16 16/17 17/18 Actual (£m) Actual (£m) Actual (£m) Actual (£m) Actual (£m)
Page 117 Page Annual Budget (£m) Actual (£m) 16/17 Q1 16/17 Q2 16/17 Q3 16/17 Q4 17/18 Q1 Capital expenditure trend Breakdown by directorate (%) The annual data shows that since 2014-15 the MPS have consistently underspent by at least 33% compared capital budget agreed at the start 12% of the year. This reflects the complexity, scale and ambition of the Met’s 7% capital programme and has historically resulted in a combination of 11% project slippage and under delivery. 8% 34% 12% Capital spend was around 40% lower in the first quarter of 2016-17 than 0.4% 6% 46% the final quarter and then falls again in the first quarter of 2017-18. This 12% 42% pattern is common in capital spending programmes, but one that will be monitored by MOPAC and the Met. 36% 40%
59% The MPS are working to develop their capital processes to reduce 50% underspends through the year. 51% 42% 32%
13/14 * 14/15 * 15/16 * 16/17 17/18 (Forecast) Property Services Digital Policing NCTPHQ Fleet Services Other * NCTPHQ – Counter Terrorism spend not included in 13/14 to 15/16 as the unit was not part of the MPS. Since 2016/17 MPS became the legal 40 owner of the function and are the lead force. Reserves
Planned & Actual Position (£m)
2014/15 2015/16 2016/17 2017/18 2018/19 2019/20 2020/21 Actual Actual Actual Forecasted Planned Planned Planned Opening Reserve Balance 403.4 419.4 297.9 240.2 149.1 127.4 102.1 Net Reserve Movement 16.0 - 121.5 - 57.7 - 91.1 - 21.7 - 25.3 14.4 Closing reserve Balance 419.4 297.9 240.2 149.1 127.4 102.1 116.5
Page 118 Page General Fund Reserve 46.6 46.6 46.6 46.6 46.6 46.6 46.6 General Fund Reserve % to Net Budget (Ex Grant funding & Precept) 2% 2% 2% 2% 2% 2% 2% Earmarked Reserves 372.8 251.3 193.6 102.5 80.8 55.5 69.9 Earmarked Reserve as % to Net Budget (Ex Grant funding & Precept) 15% 10% 8% 4% 3% 2% 3%
Earmarked revenue reserves are being used to support the major change programme, address risks in its delivery and to meet one off exit and redundancy costs. The Met are pursuing a policy of investing their earmarked revenue reserves in transformation and change. These have fallen from £373m at the end of 2014-15 (15% of the net budget) to £194m at the end of 2016-17 (8%). They are forecast to fall to £70m by the end of 2020-21 (3%). General reserves which are retained in order to accommodate unexpected pressures are held at £47m (less than 2%). According to analysis by the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners this is lower than the average across most other forces which at the end of 2016-17 stood at 10% for earmarked reserves and 3% for general reserves.
The MOPAC capital receipts reserve is significant at 31 March 2017 due to receipt from sale of New Scotland Yard. All of the capital receipts reserve is scheduled for use within the years 2017-19 to support the MOPAC capital investment programme. At that point MOPAC is estimating that new and additional borrowing will be required.
41 MOPAC Commissioning Page 119 Page
42 MOPAC Commissioning
The Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime’s role as a £1.1m commissioner has developed significantly since the creation of the office, following the enactment of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011. In 2012/13 MOPAC Total MOPAC commissioning budget was £23.6m; this has grown substantially to a budget of £42.3m in 2017/18. £6.6m Commissioning MOPAC’s commissioning has aided the development of regional 2017/18 and local partnerships, levering in match funding with a focus on £16.6m efficient and effective services. MOPAC has also put in place new approaches to commissioning, working more to develop consortia arrangements across the voluntary and statutory Page 120 Page sectors as well as testing alliance based commissioning models; £42.3m putting the providers more at the forefront of service change £9.3m and improvement.
Future quarterly reports will provide more detail in this area. One of the key funding streams ins the LCPF, see next slide for breakdown.
£8.7m
A better criminal justice system Keeping children and young people safe Tackling violence against women and girls A better policing service for London Standing together against hatred, intolerance and extremism
43 London Crime Prevention Fund 2017/18 Fund Allocation across PCP areas 2017/18 Fund Allocation across Boroughs Children and young people Hate crime and extremism Boroughs Total Allocation 17/18 Neighbourhood policing Violence against women and girls Barking and Dagenham £640,000 Wider Criminal Justice System Barnet £457,406 Bexley £299,400 Brent £591,429 Bromley £350,000 Camden £528,000 Croydon £708,498 Ealing £596,363 £5,521,093 £5,325,717 Enfield £523,581 Greenwich £567,832 Hackney £870,000 Hammersmith and Fulham £444,043 Haringey £781,000 Harrow £232,000 Page 121 Page Havering £313,502 £494,007 £1,397,997 Hillingdon £490,468 £4,038,770 Hounslow £446,070 Islington £645,524 Kensington and Chelsea £325,640 The London Crime Prevention Fund enables MOPAC to continue to support local Kingston upon Thames £165,425 community safety and prevention services whilst also recognising that some London Lambeth £680,613 challenges relating to the Police and Crime Plan priorities could be better addressed Lewisham £751,500 through greater collaboration. This approach will encourage the co-design, co- Merton £220,943 commissioning and co-delivery of services, provide efficiencies from joining up Newham £831,796 services across areas and providers and ensure that Londoners have access to the Redbridge £391,000 services they need. The fund strikes a balance between maintaining crucial local Richmond upon Thames £145,500 programmes while supporting collaborative work between different areas and Southwark £709,000 organisations. MOPAC has allocated £16.8m in 2017/18 to the LCPF and has allocated a further Sutton £235,428 £15.7m in 2018/19. Tower Hamlets £806,230 In our future reports MOPAC will provide further information on this spend and Waltham Forest £590,433 other areas of commissioning. Wandsworth £543,000 Westminster £895,961 Grand Total £16,777,584 44 This page is intentionally left blank
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Annex A Metropolitan Police Service
Met Business Plan 2017-18, Quarter 1 update (April to June 2017)
1- INTRODUCTION 2 Quarter 1 overview 2
2- OUR FOCUSED PRIORITIES 3 Keeping children and young people safe 3 Tackling violence against women and girls 5 Tackling hate crime 6 Making London safer 6
3- A SAFER CITY FOR EVERYONE 8 A visible presence 8 An accessible force 8 An effective response 10 Local and specialist investigations 10 Improving outcomes 11
4- A TRANSFORMED, MODERN, EFFICIENT MET 12
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1- Introduction Quarter 1 overview Operational policing in London is the responsibility of the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Cressida Policing in London is facing unprecedented Dick who took up her post in April this year. challenges. The horrific events of the first quarter of the financial year have reminded us that there is Our 2017-18 priorities are to: no such thing as a typical quarter in policing. The terrorist attacks Manchester, London Bridge and Tackle violent crime and especially knife crime Finsbury Park required huge police deployment which affects young people across London both in the immediate incident response and in the Counter terrorism and review our strategy, management of the aftermath, investigation, public tactics and resources in light of the threat reassurance deployments and reaching out to Protect children and develop a robust London’s communities. approach to tackling child sexual exploitation
Transform the Met to become a modern police The tragedy of the Grenfell Tower fire in June force using technology, data, skills and 2017, deeply felt across the community, showed engagement to fight crime more effectively the extraordinary response from the local and wider community. This update reports our progress in implementing our new Business Plan and our actions (as at Quarter 1 was also marked by the widespread Quarter 1, 2017-18) to bear down on crime and disruptions to the NHS of the Wannacry virus, a violence and to support delivery of the Mayor’s reminder that digital attacks can have create Police and Crime Plan. It complements the substantial and real disruptions. Moped-enabled MOPAC quarterly data pack. crime and acid attacks highlighted the complexity of tactics that officers have to confront. Some of our Business Plan quarterly milestones focus on the implementation of our transformation Current recorded crime figures over the last twelve programme (the One Met Model), whilst others are months are showing increases across the country. relate to policing London (both “business as usual” Whilst these rises are of strong concern, levels and how we improve policies and processes). An generally remain lower than 5 years ago. There update is provided here on all Q1 and Q2 are some acknowledged under-reported crimes, milestones. such as sexual offences, where we want to see more reporting. Reporting in these areas is continuing to rise which does suggest greater stronger confidence of victims in the Met’s determination to tackle offenders.
June saw the publication of the Mayor’s knife crime strategy, bringing together partners and communities to fight this scourge that affects so many young people and families. Following the increases in knife crime witnessed in particular Milestone reporting early in Quarter 1, the Met strengthened Operation Sceptre deploying a set of tactics including Our Met Business Plan milestones are in enforcement, diversion and prevention. blue. Our progress against them is in black. Consensus is that the police cannot tackle this crime alone: many partners have a key role to play Q1 milestones are set against a green and we have sought to intensify engagement with background, whilst interim progress on Q2 these partners and with communities. milestones is on a grey background.
Status is assessed as follows: delivered
on track
some delays
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Offences, Exploitation and Child Abuse 2- Our focused Command (SCO17 and SCO5) have been integrated, offering a single “front door” model for all referrals for: priorities vulnerable children and adults the investigation of domestic abuse, Tackling high harm crimes are a priority for the Met rape and sexual offences and the Mayor. The growth in demand from and child abuse domestic abuse, sexual offences, child protection, It brings together a wide range of mental health and hate crime - together with a specialised experience in investigating critical look of how it has delivered some of these complex crimes. services in the past - has led us to review how we are configured to best protect vulnerable people. From July onwards, a period of evaluation Focused operations are discussed in later is taking place to see if the benefits sections, but in terms of overarching actions, we envisaged have come into fruition, and to are: analyse what has worked and what needs bringing together teams that investigate these improving further. crimes into one place investing more in prevention and problem solving; working closely with partners to identify risk and signpost vulnerable people to the appropriate agency to provide support making clear that safeguarding is the responsibility of every single police officer. All Keeping children and officers - whether working in neighbourhoods, a response team or investigation - need to be young people safe able to be proactive in spotting the signs of individuals who are vulnerable embedding its safeguarding service in Q1 Business Plan milestone: “Deliver neighbourhood policing. These officers best our new child safeguarding training to understand local communities and are at the all local officers across the boroughs” frontline for protecting vulnerable people. They are also best placed to offer victims the Safeguarding training was delivered to appropriate level of support and care and all frontline officers in professional investigate at the earliest opportunity development days. With an introduction retaining central specialist capability to from Assistant Commissioner Martin investigate the most serious of crimes and Hewitt stressing the importance of this provide specialist advice to frontline officers area of policing, topics covered child abuse; criminal and sexual exploitation; The Met BCU pathfinder sites are currently testing missing children; children affected by this new structure, and our ambition is to invest domestic abuse; risks to children from further resources in this critical area with 400 more extremism; risks to children from on-line officers across London. abusers. Real life case studies were used to illustrate risks and harm, and what action officers need to take. Q1 Business Plan milestone: “Put in place our new safeguarding approach Following feedback from staff, the in the two pathfinder BCUs” (One Met safeguarding theme will continue in Q3, Model transformation programme 2: with a focus on children, social media “Strengthening local policing”) and the internet, and the role of police and other agencies in keeping children In April 2017, we set up a new joined-up safe. Safeguarding function in our two new “Pathfinders”: the East Area BCU (which The training content for Q1 and Q3 has brings together Havering, Redbridge and been developed in consultation with Barking & Dagenham) and the Central internal subject matter experts, leading North BCU (Camden and Islington). academics, and representatives from external organisations who act in an Services previously delivered separately advisory capacity to the Met. by borough units and the Sexual
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sharing with partner agencies and preventative Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Deliver tactics through early intervention with young internal communication and people. Since May 2016, over 2,700 people have awareness campaign on child been charged with possession of a knife - protection across the organisation” representing a charge rate of 85 per cent for all arrests for this offence. This is on track to be delivered in Q2 with an internal communications plan The latest phase saw more than 500 arrests and launched on 8 August, informed by the over 400 weapons taken off the streets. Making an staff survey and outcomes from case impact in this area is heavily dependent on our audits. This will run for the next 12 work with schools, where we have 300 Safer months supporting operational activity. It Schools Officers delivering presentations and will focus on four themes in quarterly educational packages to pupils to highlight the campaigns (Children sexual exploitation, potentially devastating consequences of carrying a Gangs, Missing children and Child knife (over 14,000 young people reached over the abuse) using a wide range of supports past year). (posters, intranet features, blogs, podcasts etc). Q1 Business Plan milestone: “Support MOPAC to publish a Knife Crime strategy”
Knife Crime We supported MOPAC in the development of the knife crime strategy The use of knives on London’s streets has and actions. The strategy was published become a worrying trend and a concerted effort by in June. the Met is taking place to reduce offences, under Operation Sceptre. The Met continues to use Stop and Search to In Quarter 1, the Met has established a new protect Londoners, tackle crime and keep streets taskforce of 100 officers, made up of both safe. This can be a particularly valuable tool to uniformed officers and detectives focusing on hot tackle knife and gun crime, resulting in over 3,500 spots across London and intelligence-led arrests for weapons in the past year. Whilst there operations on an intensive basis. We also has been a reduction in the number of searches in intensified Operation Sceptre: activity includes recent years, the Met’s arrest rate is 20 per cent, proactive and reactive operations, information the best of any major force in England and Wales,
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and one third of all searches result in a positive outcome. Tackling violence against Another particular concern is the theft of mopeds, which represent more than half of all vehicle stolen women and girls in the past year. These stolen vehicles are often used on to snatch valuables (particularly mobile The Met is encouraging better reporting and phones) from members of the public. developing new ways for victims of crimes such as domestic abuse and sexual offences to report To help reduce offences, the Met launched the Be abuse. We know (through the Crime Survey for Safe campaign in Q1, focused on the rise in England and Wales) that violence against women moped theft (and in moped-enabled crime). The and girls is known under-reported. Increases can campaign encourages owners to better secure reflect increased confidence from victims in their vehicles and prevent theft – and potentially speaking to the Police rather than an actual the subsequent use of the vehicle in many other increase in a crime type. crimes.
This supports Operation Venice, our response to Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Support the theft of motorcycles, scooters and mopeds, MOPAC to review the Violence against and associated crimes. Tactics used include Women and Girls (VAWG) Strategy” increasing street searches, ANPR operations, working with partner agencies to prevent and We are currently working with MOPAC to design out crime, sharing information and using review their “Violence against women and intelligence and CCTV to identify linked offences. girls” strategy, building on their “London domestic violence needs assessment” report, to ensure that we put all in place to tackle offenders and support victims, working with partners across London.
We attend the MOPAC VAWG Board and MOPAC VAWG co-ordinators group and will be assisting with consultation in the re- writing of the VAWG strategy. Specialist training for officers is at the heart of our approach, and we have increased the numbers of officers and staff working
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across our borough-based Community Safety Units to bring the total up to just over 900.
All frontline officers working in borough policing now get additional specialist training in domestic abuse, incorporating updates on the latest legislation, investigative techniques, victim care and how to best target offenders. We are looking at all the ways in which new technology can be used to increase our effectiveness in bringing domestic abuse
offenders to justice, from giving officers fast time access to digital copies of 999 calls, to the use of body worn video to capture best evidence and electronic handheld devices to record statements Q1 Business Plan milestone: “Launch and photographs at the scene. the Online Hate Crime Hub”
In April 2017 we launched with MOPAC a Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Start new Online Hate Crime Hub unit with four implementing the Stalking Threat dedicated Met police officers, led by a Assessment Centre if the funding bid is Detective Inspector. It aims to improve the successful” police response to online hate by gathering
intelligence, improving understanding and We have been working with the Suzy testing new investigation methods. Lamplugh Trust on a joint funding bid to
create a dedicated Stalking Threat Once an online hate crime has been Assessment Centre with a pan London reported, it is automatically referred to the responsibility for high-risk stalking Hub, which will provide referrals to offenders. This centre will review incoming specialist victim support partners and work cases on a daily basis, with referrals with the relevant borough officers to carry coming in from mental health teams in out a thorough investigation. The Hub has London boroughs as well as the trust. At already established excellent working the time of writing, the bid is awaiting sign relationships with Facebook and Twitter. off by the Policing Minister. We have also
been liaising with the National Centre for
Cyberstalking Research to try and tackle
the growing number of offences
committed online. Making London safer
Q1 was unprecedented with, in the wake of the
Westminster attack in March 2017, further terrorist Tackling hate crime attacks at the Manchester Arena, London Bridge and Finsbury Park. A number of other plots were
also foiled before they could be carried out. The aftermaths of such events can bring a spike in hate crime and specifically Islamophobic hate These attacks took a heavy toll on our officers – crime. Following the terrorist attacks in the London with the murder of PC Keith Palmer in Westminster Bridge area in June 2017, there was such an and a number of officers injured in the London increase in the number of offences recorded. Our Bridge incident. The courage, selflessness and response will continue to demonstrate how human response of our officers, staff and other seriously we take these acts. emergency services against these inhuman
attacks showed the real measure of our Q1 also saw us launch the Online Hate Crime Hub effectiveness. The attacks placed a significant pilot to tackle hate crime that is committed online stretch on our organisation – in terms of and particularly through social networks. manpower and funding. However they demonstrated that our capability programme to
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strengthen Armed Policing is having the intended Awareness Session and became operational effect in terms of the enhanced armed Dementia Friends (officially recognised response we were able to provide. status from the Alzheimer’s Society). The Herbert Protocol packs are accessible here: Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Finalise https://www.met.police.uk/herbertprotocol the Business Case for Skills House (on Firearms training)” (One Met Model transformation programme 5: Q1 Business Plan milestone: “Publish a “Strengthening our armed policing Mental Health Toolkit with clear capability”) operational and tactical guidance for officers and staff dealing with someone We are developing the business case who has mental ill health, as well as for and considering a range of options external partners” including through the National Programme. These will be considered in The Mental Health Toolkit Q3. (http://mpsweb.intranet.mps/policing/safeg uarding/mental-health-policy/ ) was published early July. It provides instructions and advice to frontline officers and supervisors and is specifically geared towards providing clear operational and tactical guidance when dealing with Mental health someone who has mental ill health. It also helps our officers and staff explain the HMIC’s annual State of Policing report published police position to members of the public, at the beginning of this year drew attention to the the management and staff in local health increasing burden police are bearing because of trusts. shortages in mental healthcare provision, which is a London-wide problem. The toolkit can be circulated to external partners: we are planning a higher profile Whilst prevention through better healthcare would communication campaign linking with be preferable to police response, we have been MOPAC Thrive. working hard to improve our approach to mental health and the quality of care we provide.
Modern slavery
Q1 Business Plan milestone: “Establish effective information sharing arrangements with all partner agencies on Modern Slavery including NGOs, and a consistent approach through engagement with partners”
Q1 Business Plan milestone: “Launch The MPS currently has three Formalised and pan-London rollout of the Herbert Information Arrangements (ISA) with: Protocol with Alzheimer's Society” Bakhita House (Joint working with Caritas, Roman catholic charity We launched the Herbert Protocol on 15th providing accommodation and ongoing June. All our operational units were support for victims of Modern Slavery) represented at the launch. The Alzheimer’s RAHAB (Kensington and Chelsea Society set out the benefit of being NGO offering outreach work and Dementia Aware and their goal of making accommodation predominantly for London the first Dementia Friendly Capital victims of sexual exploitation) City. Attendees received a Dementia
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TAMAR (Westminster NGO offering outreach work predominantly for 3- A safer city for victims of sexual exploitation)
Within the Joint Money Laundering everyone intelligence team, and through the Criminal Assets strand, we work closely with the banking industry to share modern slavery A visible presence information. We are committed to have at least two Dedicated Through National Policing and the Police Ward Officers (DWOs each of the 629 wards in Transformation Fund, we are formally London) by December 2017. As at June 2017, linked into the Joint Slavery and Trafficking substantial progress has been made towards this Analysis Team. This ensures close working target: 1,171 DWOs were in place against a target and intelligence sharing with other of 1,258 by December. prosecuting agencies (such as the NCA, Gangmasters Labour and Abuse Authority, Ward internet pages are now in place for all Home Office Immigration and Enforcement London wards, linked to Twitter accounts to try and UK Border Force; the Triage Centre, and address the fact that residents do not always which we are currently establishing as a feel informed about local information provision. pilot within the MPS on behalf of National Policing). Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Assess Due to the vast number of NGOs within and evaluate the two BCU pathfinders this arena we also work on a victim-by- and consider pan-London victim basis to ensure that they are implementation” (One Met Model provided with appropriate support, from transformation programme 3: accommodation, outreach work, access to “Strengthening local policing”) health care and counselling. We aim to formalising these ISAs in the future, Crime, safeguarding and neighbourhood working closely with the NGOs and our functions on the BCU pathfinders are Information Rights Unit to achieve this. standing up well and as planned, however Response was underperforming in Quarter 1 and remedial work has been Q1 Business Plan milestone: “Joint taking place to address this (response Modern Slavery summit with MOPAC rates recovered in Quarter 2). There may involving key partners across the be a slight delay in the evaluation to capital and continue to raise public assess the impact of the remedial work awareness” (i.e. September onwards). Discussions are taking place with operational On 10th May, the Met and MOPAC practitioners and workforce supported the Conference on Human representatives at MetCC in August over Trafficking and Modern Slavery for London the introduction of the BCU Pathfinders Boroughs at City Hall. DCI Phil Brewer and concerns over the future of the presented the Met work at this event current three site model, working with to organised by the Human Trafficking address the key drivers of these Foundation, the SHIVA Foundation (which concerns. aims to tackle modern slavery by facilitating a more collaborative approach to making change), ecpat UK (protecting children everywhere). MOPAC also chairs a London Modern Slavery Steering Group An accessible force which we support. The Met is working hard to ensure it continues to become an even more efficient organisation that provides an effective service, value for money as well as a service that is valued by Londoners.
The One Met Model, our transformation portfolio to 2020, strives to achieve this goal within the context
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of reducing resources. It is made of twelve programmes at various stages of implementation. The public uptake of our online services Of particular note in Q1, is the development of our continues to increase: over 34,000 crime new website, with local information pages and reports have been received since the crime reporting capability – a first step towards system went live. providing people with a “virtual police station” that is easily accessible, even more responsive and Online crime reporting now accounts for helps Londoners find the right local prevention 9 per cent of all crime reported to the Met advice. (June 2017). 74 per cent of users surveyed are satisfied with the online Forthcoming improvements for Q2 will include the crime reporting system. 12 per cent of concluding rollout of Body Worn Video and mobile the reports represent new demand technology to officers that will improve response (where respondents said they would not and the time we spend policing neighbourhoods. have reported the crime, had they not been able to do it online). In July 2017 MOPAC launched a 12-week public consultation on our Public Access strategy, Two-thirds of self-reported road traffic supported by a front counter footfall survey on how incidents are now reported online (over people want to be able to access our services. We 19,000 Road Traffic Incidents forms are delaying the implementation of our Estate received since the new system went live) Transformation programme to allow for responses and allegations from the public of poor to be taken into account. The programme is driving standards have increased at least currently rated red in part to reflect the associated threefold. re-profiling in budget and benefits delivery.
Q1 Business Plan milestone: “Implement a new website which allows information to flow to and from Q1 Business Plan milestone: the public” “Develop online crime reporting for victims of volume crimes through the The new MPS website went live March new website” (One Met Model 2017. Voice Your Concerns went live on transformation programme 2: “Improving ward pages at the end of May. This public access and first contact”) enables the public to vote on issues that
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concern them. To date, 74 per cent of wards have seen engagement from the The strategic case has been approved at public through this method. PIB and by MOPAC so we have delivered this milestone ahead of Demonstrating the two-way flows, we schedule. received over 4,500 online reports of potential terrorist information since the new system went live, a large spike in Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Start the these reports following the terrorist full roll out of all mobile devices incidents earlier in the year. (laptops and tablets) from August to April 2018” (One Met Model transformation programme 7: “Smarter Q1 Business Plan milestone: “Put in working”) place ward internet pages with updated and locally relevant The deployment of laptops continues prevention advice” and the tablet rollout is scheduled to begin in August in a couple of boroughs, Ward internet pages are in place and and to BCUs in September, allowing Safer Neighbourhood Teams (SNT) officers to log reports immediately, Twitter accounts are now linked to them. without returning to the police station. We have almost completed the rollout of smartphones to SNT officers which enables them to tweet whilst out on Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Set up an patrol, keeping residents informed. improved public reporting mechanism Twitter usage by these teams is steadily for stop and search data” increasing with 61 per cent of the wards now tweeting on at least a weekly basis. This action is complete ahead of schedule. The online ‘stop and search dashboard’ is available at this address: Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Finalise https://beta.met.police.uk/stats-and- outline business cases for the data/stop-and-search-dashboard refurbishment of Tranche 1 Estate” It replaces the previous monitoring (One Met Model transformation mechanism report (MMR). programme 11: “Transforming the MPS estate”) It is updated automatically on the 8th of each month (previously this required The business case itself is on track but manual input). Importantly the dashboard there are dependencies with the Public is interactive, and users are able to pivot Access consultation and the BCU the data for improved scrutiny. Pathfinders evaluation, which may change our approach and impact on implementation.
Local and specialist investigations An effective response By Q1, we rolled out 14,000 Body Worn Video The new In-vehicle mobile applications went live in cameras to frontline officers (including in Q1, June 2017, ready for rolling out to 1,300 vehicles Hackney, Greenwich, Sutton, Tower Hamlets, in the summer (with a full rollout taking place Enfield and recently Newham). Over 2,800 September to March 2018). evidential clips have already been shared with CPS through the new COPA application – this is a good start and it is expected to rise considerably in Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Finalise the coming months. the strategic case for the Optimising Response programme” (One Met Model transformation programme 2: “Optimising response”)
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throughput. By February 2018, the supporting Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Complete training roll out will be complete, the uplift in use the roll out of the BWV equipment to will have begun and the number of positive 22,000 officers” (One Met Model outcome crimes should be rising. transformation programme 4: “Transforming investigation and prosecution”) Q1 Business Plan milestone: “Launch Operation BEAT ('Briefing, This is on track to roll out to all 32 Engagement, Active Tasking') and boroughs prior to Notting Hill Carnival. routinely share information and intelligence relating to high and very high risk registered sex offenders with Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Finalise local officers” the business case for Covert Policing Management Platform” We are continuing to work to ensure this Met-wide project reaches all Safer The business case has been delayed Neighbourhood Teams (SNT) whilst awaiting costs and statement of management. All boroughs have requirement. The Full Business case is published an intelligence briefing for now expected in October 2017. SNTs. To support this work further, DI Tachauer hosted a briefing for all SNT/NPT Inspectors in August. Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Launch the external entry Detective Constable We are already seeing positive results campaign” (One Met Model regarding sex offender management as a transformation programme 8: “Workforce direct result of the implementation of futures”) Operation BEAT. An example of this occurred in Hackney where SNT officers This was delivered early. The External gathered intelligence regarding a Entry Detective Constable recruitment particular offender; this information was pathway launched in Q1, with passed to the JIGSAW team who were applications closing 3 July – the initiative able to establish that the offender had has received positive media coverage breached his Sexual Harm Prevention and attracted an uptake beyond Order. He is now serving 20 weeks in expectations; including, to date, prison. Without the assistance of the SNT encouraging diversity ratios (the final it is unlikely these breaches would have ratio will be provided at Q2). Sift, and been discovered. An evaluation of the first selection of the External Entry Detective 6 month period will take place in Q3. Constable cohort will be completed in Q2. Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Effectively The first cohort of Met Special Constable manage performance of JIGSAW to Detective Constable recruits started through our new performance training at the end of May, on schedule. management framework” Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Implement a new guidance for police IOM officers to allow for an effective and consistent implementation across London” Improving outcomes We are on target to deliver both the We are working to improve both victims’ performance management framework and satisfaction, as well as the way we are managing a new guidance for Integrated Offender offenders. Management (IOM) officers. Performance is reviewed regularly at our internal We are in the process of rolling out Community Crimefighters meetings. Resolution across London. This will ensure that all Met frontline officers have the ability to deliver a Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Review community resolution in appropriate cases to arrangements and future needs for improve public confidence and to assist with juveniles in detention, including managing demand by reducing custody
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provision of health services and number of female and BAME officers has appropriate adults” increased, with female officers accounting for over a quarter (26 per cent) of all police officers, and Following HMIC recommendations, we BAME officers for 14 per cent of all police officers. have set up a cross-agency “Review of Children in Police Detention” Working Group (covering both accommodation of detained juvenile as well as the provision Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Establish of appropriate adults). The first meeting, the new grievance service and with CSC directors, NHS and other underpinning governance framework, partners took place in July. roll out new training to all senior 'single points of contact' and local Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Work with resolution champions across the Met” MOPAC and partners to expand women offenders diversion offer, such as, This is on track: the training of our subject to a successful Transformation Informal Resolution Champions Fund bid, the Women Offenders concluded in July. All Single points of Diversion Scheme through four contacts (SPOCs) are in place. SPOCs London hubs” will encourage and implement local resolution where this can be done and Unfortunately the funding bid was not be responsible for overseeing grievance successful but MOPAC and partners have management at a local level, working committed to seeking funds from another with HR Case Managers to regularly source and looking to use innovation review grievances. Training for SPOCs is funding or alternatives. A new co- taking place 31st May to 10th Aug. commissioning group has been set up and update on progress will be reported at Quarter 2. Q2 forthcoming milestone: “Publish our Diversity and Inclusion Strategy”
The strategy is in final draft form and has been agreed by the STRIDE Board. 4- A transformed, Publication is expected in September.
modern, efficient Met Conclusion We continue to encourage a force that “looks like London”, and the recent direct entry detective This is our first quarterly progress report against campaign is showing promising uptake from our Business Plan. Whilst not all our areas of BAME and women candidates. As at Q1, the activity have a milestone for the first quarter, the report shows the breadth of our work and the extent of our transformational investments –both technological and human, to tackle the considerable challenges facing London. The Quarter 2 update report, to be published in November, will expand on this work.
12 Page 134 Agenda Item 7
Subject: Police and Crime Committee Work Programme
Report to: Police and Crime Committee
Report of: Executive Director of Secretariat Date: 17 October 2017
This report will be considered in public
1. Summary
1.1 This report sets out progress on the Police and Crime Committee’s work programme.
2. Recommendations
2.1 That the Committee notes its work programme as set out in the report.
2.2 That the Committee delegates authority to the Chairman, in consultation with party Group Lead Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM, to write to the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime in advance of the publication of the Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy.
3. Background
3.1 The Committee’s work programme is intended to enable the Committee to effectively fulfil its roles of holding the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) to account and investigating issues of importance to policing and crime reduction in London. The Committee’s work involves a range of activities, including formal meetings with MOPAC, the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) and other stakeholders, site visits, written consultations and round table meetings.
3.2 The Committee will usually meet twice a month. One of the monthly meetings is usually to hold a question and answer (Q&A) session with the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime. The Commissioner of the MPS has been invited to these meetings. The Committee will primarily use Q&A meetings to investigate topical issues and review MPS performance, including consideration of MOPAC’s approach to holding the MPS to account.
3.3 The Committee’s other monthly meeting is used to consider a particular topic or aspect of policing and crime in greater detail. These investigations will be conducted either by the full Committee or working groups. Working groups will have delegated authority to prepare reports on the Committee’s behalf in consultation with party Group Lead Members. Full reports will be approved and published by the full Committee.
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4. Issues for Consideration
4.1 The work programme has been designed to proactively examine issues of interest but also allows for flexibility to respond to topical issues and for the Committee to react to MOPAC’s work programme. Topics will be added to the timetable for Q&A meetings as they arise.
4.2 The updated work programme agreed at the meeting of the Committee on 20 September 2017 is set out below. Members are currently in discussion about the work programme for the remainder of the year.
Month Thematic Topic Q&A Session November Two thematic meetings: Wednesday 15 November 2017 Wednesday 1 November 2017 Q&A meeting Thematic meeting – Women offenders in London; and
Thursday 30 November 2017 Thematic meeting – TBC
December No thematic meeting. Wednesday 13 December 2017 Q&A meeting
Women Offenders in London 4.3 The Committee’s thematic meeting on 1 November 2017 will be used for a discussion on women offenders in London. While women make up a small amount of the overall number of offenders in London, they are, however, a distinct group that often have very specific needs in relation to preventing offending and rehabilitation. This meeting will examine whether the current and proposed approach to dealing with women offenders in London is an effective one, particularly in the light of the closure of HM Prison Holloway in July 2016.
Site Visits 4.4 From time to time the Committee undertakes site visits to inform its work. The Committee has agreed previously to undertake site visits to Hendon Police College, the MPS’s training centre at Gravesend, and Members have requested that a visit be arranged to the MPS’s new headquarters at New Scotland Yard. It is anticipated that these visits will take place in the next few months.
Violence Against Women and Girls (VAGW) Strategy
4.5 Members attended and informal meeting with the DMPC and officers from MOPAC to discuss the forthcoming VAWG strategy on 5 October 2017. Arising from that meeting, it is proposed that the Chairman, in consultation with party Group Lead Members and Caroline Pidgeon MBE, write to the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime in advance of the publication of the VAGW strategy.
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5. Legal Implications
5.1 The Committee has the power to do what is recommended in this report.
6. Financial Implications
6.1 There are no financial implications to the Greater London Authority arising from this report.
List of appendices to this report: None
Local Government (Access to Information) Act 1985 List of Background Papers: None
Contact Officer: Janette Roker, Scrutiny Manager Telephone: 020 7983 6562 E-mail: [email protected]
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