DECISION RECORD
Decision I D: P C C M L 000608 2021
Decision title
Collaboration between Thames Valley Violence Reduction Unit (Thames Valley Police), Hampshire Constabulary and Hampshire’s Violence Reduction Unit to advance data capabilities to support and Community Safety Partnerships across the South East region
Executive summary
The Police and Crime Commissioner (P C C) supported partnership information sharing and evidence requirements through the provision of InterACT. This platform now supports other South East community safety partnerships, including Thames Valley Together (Community Partnership arrangement). Thames Valley’s Violence Reduction Unit have heavily invested in a pioneering analytics project, accessing live data to increase the capabilities of visualisation products, including machine learning. This paper recommends development support through an upskilling programme that will enable Hampshire Constabulary (H C) and the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner (O P C C) to accelerate collective digital ambitions.
Recommendation
That the Police and Crime Commissioner approves funding of £51,532 for the financial year 2021/22 from the Commissioner’s Reserve to be given to Thames Valley Police to support the following:
Analytical upskilling is required to access the data architecture across partnerships. A contribution is recommended to enable a joint, pioneering capability to create automated identification of risk and opportunities for prevention, bringing together council and police data.
A model, provided by consultancy firm Simpsons to be implemented, connecting data architecture to visualisation products supporting Violence Reduction Units and Community Safety Partnerships.
That the authority is delegated to the Head of Strategic Commissioning and Partnerships to agree the terms of the funding agreement.
Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner (OP C C) Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Portsmouth, Southampton
DECISION RECORD
Decision I D: P C C M L 000608 2021
Statement on publication
This Decision Record and supporting Decision Request documentation is suitable for publication.
Police and Crime Commissioner approval
I hereby approve the recommendation above.
Comments on the decision taken:
Approved collaboration with Thames Valley Police and interaction with the V R Us and C S Ps for the sum of £51,532.
Signature:
Name: Michael Lane Police and Crime Commissioner for Hampshire
Date: 16-Mar-21
Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner (OP C C) Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Portsmouth, Southampton
DECISION REQUEST
Decision I D: P C C M L 000608 2021
Decision Window: 2021-03
Document version history:
Table 1 - Document version history
Version Version Requester of change Summary of changes Number date 1.0 4-Mar-21 Not applicable – First Not applicable – First issue. issue 1.1 10-Mar-21 O P C C Programme Office Minor changes to format. 1.2 15-Mar-21 Deputy Monitoring Responses to comments to Officer provide clarity. 1.3 15-Mar-21 Deputy Monitoring Responses to comments to Officer provide clarity. 2.0 16-Mar-21 O P C C Programme Office Addition of P C C signature following approval. Other minor changes following P C C Briefing.
Decision title:
Collaboration between Thames Valley Violence Reduction Unit (Thames Valley Police), Hampshire Constabulary and Hampshire’s Violence Reduction Unit to advance data capabilities to support and Community Safety Partnerships across the South East region
Requester details:
Requester: Anja Kimberley
Role title: Head of Performance and Information
1 Summary
The Police and Crime Commissioner (P C C) supported partnership information sharing and evidence requirements through the provision of InterACT. This platform now supports other South East community safety partnerships, including Thames Valley Together. Thames Valley’s Violence reduction unit have heavily invested in a pioneering analytics project, accessing live data to increase the capabilities of visualisation products, including machine learning. This paper recommends development support through an upskilling programme that will enable Hampshire Constabulary and the O P C C to collaborate and accelerate collective digital ambitions. v2.0 dated 16-Mar-21 Page 1
DECISION REQUEST
Decision I D: P C C M L 000608 2021
The costs proposed satisfy the requirements for skills, software, and access to information, processing and management time to capitalise on partnership relations and effective supply of shared data. In doing so, the successful information sharing platform will further contribute to a rich evidence base in support of collaborative problem solving. It currently enables timely and accurate provision of evidence to meet a range of needs, including thematic national funding opportunities for the Hampshire policing area. Thames Valley Police have so far invested around £400,000 into their analytics programme, confronting technical obstacles, designing and imbedding programmes and processes to leverage opportunities in data access. This work included the employment of a full time data engineer to establish the data architecture. The final step that that this paper recommends a contribution towards enables development of the end-to-end pipeline that will support data visualisation and InterACT. The recommendations presented will secure a step-change in capability, introducing an ability for existing data experts to access new technology providing flexible data access across the Constabulary and in collaboration with Thames Valley Police.
2 Recommendation
That the Police and Crime Commissioner approves funding of £51,532 for the financial year 2021/22 from the Commissioner’s Reserve to be given to Thames Valley Police to support the:
Analytical upskilling is required to access the data architecture across partnerships. A contribution is recommended to enable a joint, pioneering capability to create automated identification of risk and opportunities for prevention, bringing together council and police data.
A model, provided by consultancy firm Simpsons to be implemented, connecting data architecture to visualisation products supporting Violence Reduction Units and Community Safety Partnerships.
That the authority is delegated to the Head of Strategic Commissioning and Partnerships to agree the terms of the funding agreement.
3 Strategic context
InterACT has developed using some outdated methodologies due to the nature of police and partner databases. Emerging technology presents a challenge and opportunity to access live data and combine information. It is physically possible to apply machine learning to alert users of risk v2.0 dated 16-Mar-21 Page 2
DECISION REQUEST
Decision I D: P C C M L 000608 2021
areas, however the upskilling of analysts in conjunction with organisational objectives, enhanced communication between organisations and confidence in governance is essential to begin to exploit new technological capabilities. Thames Valley Police have secured £70,000, in addition to a spend of around £400k over two years to deliver a programme that will allow analysts to obtain the computer science skills necessary to manage more flexible ‘unstructured’ data, providing live insights that traditional analysis is not reasonably able to achieve.
Hampshire Constabulary have the opportunity to collaborate and have secured £50,000 from Covid-related funding towards this crucial stage in reaching the next generation of I T capability in policing data. This will support intelligence management at an individual level, and further progress the InterACT objective of combining partnership information to identify opportunity to protect the public led by population level indicators of risk. InterACT is the information mechanism that supports the Hampshire Violence Reduction unit, it is also undergoing replication to support Thames Valley Police Community Safety Partners. This collaboration enables all areas of work to develop under a united governance framework, ensuring that progress across all organisations is a collective effort to unite our data networks.
This contribution supports the Hampshire rollout of a two-year project between Thames Valley Police and Microsoft, enabling a cloud based approach to data access. This money, by means of a funding agreement, will specifically contribute to a model to connect the data architecture to tools including data visualisation that enable machine learning, and to upskill staff to maintain and develop the products. The prosed senior stakeholder group includes a representative from Hampshire’s Violence Reduction Unit within the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner (O P C C) and have an option to oversee areas of technical development. Thames Valley Police have themselves invested £400k and have developed the information governance, security and assurance for the project, this included the provision of a full time data engineer and development of the data architecture. The benefits for InterACT include:
An ability to analyse big data, using machine learning to identify risk and assimilate patterns and trends, supporting the ambition of a public health approach and supporting the V R U.
A governance structure that allows all sharable products produced by Thames Valley Police and Hampshire Constabulary to be included in InterACT.
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DECISION REQUEST
Decision I D: P C C M L 000608 2021
An opportunity to measure whole system costs by organisation, by unit. For example the cost in demand created by a crime.
In information sharing opportunity to reduce the risk of national data partners making choices between fragmented systems.
Total cost £51,532
Collectively, the above recommendations allow the ability to compare and contrast public perceptions, reported crime and insights from partner organisations to detect risk and support allocation of resources for all partners accessing the InterACT platform. The overall costs capitalise on the maintenance of successful measures and the progression to a digital intelligence capability, a pioneer in the next generation of evidence-led crime prevention.
4 Options appraisal
Development aligned to modern technologies will create greater efficiencies and allow sufficient response to user demand. The risk of only maintaining existing work could lead to fragmented and duplicated systems and increased barriers to obtaining data.
Technology is developing quickly and as a front-runner for information sharing, the O P C C has been able to co-ordinate evidence with accuracy and speed to secure external funding opportunities and target delivery. It has been possible to devise robust evaluation strategies and therefore assure effective spend of public monies to improve safety.
Development will engage a wider range of users, and with them knowledge and skills to promote effective collaboration to reduce crime. It will secure and build on the work conducted and provide new opportunities to exploit new technology to reduce duplication, improve our depth of knowledge and understand the effectiveness of commissioned services and other interventions.
Supporting the skills development in Thames Valley and Hampshire Constabularies provides the O P C C with a governance role in the development of new technologies and their contribution to access of partnership data through InterACT.
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DECISION REQUEST
Decision I D: P C C M L 000608 2021
5 Timescales
The options recommended for delivery would take 12 months to develop and embed.
6 Financial and resourcing implications
Total cost £51,532
Timeframe funding required for April 2021 to March 2022
Table 2 - Funding allocation in each financial year
2020-21 2021-22 2022-23 Capital £0 £0 £0 Revenue £0 £51,532 £0
Table 3 - Funding source - Capital and Revenue
Capital Revenue (insert ‘Yes’ if applicable) (insert ‘Yes’ if applicable) Transformation reserve Commissioner’s reserve Yes Commissioning budget Approved capital programme General fund
7 Communications and engagement implications
The Home Office have selected InterACT as a case study from sponsored analytical products for publication in policing magazines. This provides a hook to promote updates in proposed developments. Though collaboration with Thames Valley Police, the O P C C and Hampshire Constabulary have the opportunity to pioneer analytical capability that will support operational policing. The nature of the project makes it suitable for wider communication.
8 Legal implications
This work will ensure high quality maintenance and increase development time. All public data is covered by the Government Open Data licence. v2.0 dated 16-Mar-21 Page 5
DECISION REQUEST
Decision I D: P C C M L 000608 2021
InterACT will utilise products developed and agreed within Hampshire Constabulary and Thames Valley Police. The governance framework will ensure any products published in InterACT are suitable and approved by the authors’ organisation.
Risks of non-performance will be dealt with in and appropriate funding agreement which will be approved by the Head of Strategic Commissioning and Partnerships.
9 Risks and mitigation
The developments within the InterACT platform are a considered and planned step-change that builds on existing, embedded work.
All projects that manage personal and live data will be managed by Hampshire Constabulary and Thames Valley Police. The O P C C will ensure any new process engaged with is quality assured and approved by the respective forces as has been achieved for all existing police data products.
The overarching risk of the InterACT platform is duplication of systems that could result in data providers signing multiple contracts or choosing one system over others. Collaboration and joint governance reduces this risk, increasing the speed at which products of benefit to all parties are created.
10 Strategic policing requirement
The success of the Violence Reduction Unit (V R U) requires a close relationship with operational activity and service delivery. It has been recognised in Hampshire and the majority of V R Us nationally that more lives could be protected if emergency services were able to exchange data routinely and regularly. The connectivity of data both at individual and strategic levels is necessary to build an inter-operative, preventative mechanism. The ability to automate large volumes of data and for machines to learn from the patterns identified will enable decision makers to risk assess deployments with greater accuracy and efficiency. Hampshire Constabulary have explored the opportunities presented by the Contact Management Platform and Azure throughout implementation and are now positioned to optimise their resource utilising a sophisticated and pioneering approach to data management.
All InterACT products are user-led and the governance function proposed will ensure that police can influence priorities. v2.0 dated 16-Mar-21 Page 6
DECISION REQUEST
Decision I D: P C C M L 000608 2021
11 Equalities
The use of accessible and well presented data encourages greater use of evidence and will therefore allow inequalities to be visible, improving decisions and equality.
Where new projects are untested or have limited previous example, they will be presented to the Ethics Board for consideration.
There are multiple approaches to ethical decision-making concerning new technologies, the governance role that this work supports will ensure that the processes are reviewed, debated and agreed collectively.
The process to identify consultants and subsequent contract documentation will take account of:
The P C C’s duty to have due regard to the need to eliminate unlawful discrimination, harassment, victimisation and any other conduct that is prohibited by or under Equality Act 2010;
Advance equality of opportunity between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic and persons who do not share it and;
Foster good relations between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic and persons who do not share it.
12 Data Protection implications
Thames Valley Police and Hampshire Constabulary have concluded data protection protocols and own responsibility for personal data managed in their platforms. We will benefit from these agreements, however we continue to focus on non-personalised data that can be managed in accordance with our current Information Sharing Agreements.
InterACT will continue to service non-personalised and aggregate data. Any work with personalised data will solely be managed by the data owners or those they have a need to share their information with.
InterACT has been tested by the Information Commissioner’s Office and the processes and procedures have been approved, no personal data is held on the platform.
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DECISION REQUEST
Decision I D: P C C M L 000608 2021
13 Publication status
This Decision Request is suitable for publication.
14 Personnel consulted
The following personnel were consulted on the Decision Request.
Table 4 - Personnel consulted
Role Organisation Confirmation of consultation (insert ‘Yes’ if applicable) Chief Executive O P C C Yes Deputy Chief Executive / Assistant P C C O P C C Yes (Criminal Justice) Chief Finance Officer O P C C (H C C) Head of Strategic Commissioning and O P C C Partnerships Head of Communication and Engagement O P C C Head of Performance and Information O P C C Not applicable Head of Public Affairs (Vacant) O P C C Not applicable Head of Standards and Compliance O P C C Head of Estate, Operations and Support O P C C Programme Office Manager O P C C Accountant O P C C (H C C) Deputy Monitoring Officer O P C C (H C C) Yes Head of Strategic Procurement H C C Commissioning and Partnerships Officer O P C C O P C C - Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner H C C – Hampshire County Council
15 Appendices
None.
16 Background papers
InterACT options report
Thames Valley Police: Thames Valley Together strategic paper
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