Subject: Overview of the Police and Crime Committee’s Work 2012-2016 Report to: Police and Crime Committee Report of: Executive Director of Secretariat Date: 17 March 2016 This report will be considered in public 1. Summary 1.1 This report provides a summary of the work and investigations the Committee has undertaken during this Mayoral and Assembly term from May 2012 to March 2016. 2. Recommendations 2.1 That the Committee notes the summary of the work and investigations the Committee has undertaken over the Mayoral and Assembly term, as set out in this report. 2.2 That the Committee agrees to hold a site visit to Operation Safeway on 18 March 2016 to gain a better understanding of how the MPS Roads and Transport Policing Command works to keep road users safe. 2.3 That the Committee notes the schedule of meetings for 2016/17, which is subject to agreement at the Annual Meeting of the London Assembly on 13 May 2016. 2.4 That the Committee agrees, in relation to urgent matters only, a general delegation of authority in respect of the Committee’s powers and functions (apart from those that cannot under the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011 be delegated) to the Chair of the Committee, in consultation with the party Group Lead Members of the Committee, from the close of this meeting until the Annual Meeting of the London Assembly on 13 May 2016. 3. Background 3.1 The Committee’s work programme was devised to enable it to effectively fulfil its roles both 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. City Hall, The Queen’s Walk, London SE1 2AA Enquiries: 020 7983 4100 minicom: 020 7983 4458 www.london.gov.uk 3.2 The Committee’s work over this term has involved 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. Over this Mayoral and Assembly term, the Committee has conducted 25 major investigations, and produced 19 reports. Through its regular topical Question and Answer sessions, it has covered over 100 different topics, ranging from MOPAC’s and the MPS’s finances and the delivery of local policing, through to funding and support for victims of crime, Safer Neighbourhood Boards, and how serious crimes, such as rape, are handled. 3.3 The Committee’s investigations and reports garner much interest from a wide range of stakeholders and regularly gain attention in the media. The Committee is seen as an authority on policing and crime issues in the capital and is frequently approached for its views. 3.4 A full list of the reports the Committee has published during this term is set out in Appendix 1 and a list of site visits by the Committee and other stakeholder activity is set out in Appendix 2. 4. Issues for Consideration 4.1 The following summarises some of the key pieces of work by the Committee over this term. Scrutiny of the Mayor’s Police and Crime Plan for London 4.2 At the start of this term the Mayor published his draft Police and Crime Plan for 2013-16. The Plan set out the Mayor’s priorities for policing in London and objectives for tackling crime and making London safer. To assess the objectives and goals set out in the draft plan, Members held a series of public evidence gathering meetings with academic experts, and met specifically with representatives of communities that tend to report lower confidence in the police. In March 2013, the Committee published its response to the consultation on the draft Plan. This contained 19 recommendations in relation to the Plan and its associated Estate Strategy and budget. 4.3 The Committee’s recommendations resulted in significant changes to the final Plan. As a result of the Committee’s work a greater number of named officers were allocated to London’s wards than originally planned; MOPAC developed a performance management framework and new approach to reviewing data quality; and MOPAC provided more detail about how the use of stop and search would be scrutinised. 4.4 The Committee reviewed progress against the Plan annually. Each year, Members examined each of the key targets set by MOPAC, including progress against the seven ‘priority crimes’ (MOPAC 7) that the Mayor wanted to see reduced; public confidence in the police; and progress in tackling other crimes not falling within the MOPAC 7, such as gang crime, domestic violence and rape. Where areas for improvement were identified, the Committee continued to monitor these closely throughout the following year. The Committee has ensured that information about progress against the Plan is put into the public domain. Following the Committee’s annual review of the Plan in July 2015, it published a stocktake of the Mayor’s progress. The Committee has continued to publish this information through a series of quarterly monitoring updates, giving Londoners an easily accessible and up to date single source of information about progress. Local policing The structure of local policing 4.5 The Committee has dedicated much of its time to examining the structure of local policing across London’s boroughs. The Local Policing Model (LPM) — introduced in the Mayor’s Police and Crime Plan— changed the way policing is organised in boroughs. It changed the structure of ward policing from a 1:2:3 model (1 sergeant, 2 police constables, 3 police and community support officers (PCSOs) per London ward) to a 1:1 model (1 PC and 1 PCSO per London ward), with additional support from neighbourhood officers, who cover several wards and respond flexibly to demand. To coincide with the LPM implementation, the Public Access project also went live, which, amongst other things, rationalised the number of MPS front counters in each borough. 4.6 The Committee has examined the impact of the LPM on front line resources, visibility and flexibility, and on public confidence. In its response to the consultation on the Police and Crime Plan, the majority of the Committee voiced concerns about the new model: particularly about the apparent reduction in the size of dedicated ward teams. The Committee has continued throughout the term to discuss the impact that the LPM is having on public confidence, visibility, and the ability of the MPS to respond to crime. 4.7 Towards the end of the term, Members helped to shape the policing agenda by responding to a consultation on the future of policing. In April 2015, the Committee submitted its response to the MPS’s ‘2020’ consultation, which looked at how policing could be transformed to meet new threats, pressures and challenges. The Committee highlighted that building and maintaining trust must be a key aspect of any transformation, and that silo working is unlikely to help the MPS meet the demand placed on it in the future. The diversity of the MPS 4.8 In June 2014, the Committee started an investigation into the diversity of the MPS’s frontline. Members looked specifically at what the MPS has done to recruit more Black and Minority Ethnic (BAME) officers, including how it supports BAME officers to progress through the ranks, and the representation of women and other groups with protected characteristics as defined by the Equality Act 2010. 4.10 The Committee published its report on diversity in the MPS in December 2014. The report, The Diversity of the Met's frontline1 , identified that more can be done to improve the MPS’s diversity and ensure it reflects the capital it serves. The report recognised that the MPS has made some progress, but made a number of recommendations to further increase its diversity, including targeting BAME women as a specific group and creating ‘champions’ to increase diversity; supporting flexible working to plug the rising number of female officers leaving the force; and to consider the legal implications of introducing schemes to increase diversity if other efforts to prove unsuccessful. 4.11 As a result of the report, the MPS has introduced a new ‘One MPS Scorecard’ which will put the emphasis on individual command units to have plans in place to achieve a more representative 1 https://www.london.gov.uk/about-us/london-assembly/london-assembly-publications/diversity-met-police workforce. It is also developing a new exit survey targeted at capturing the reasons why officers/staff from under-represented groups leave the force. 4.12 The report gained attention from key broadcast and online media in London, including BBC Breakfast, BBC London News, LBC 97.3 and ITV News online. The Committee established itself as an authoritative voice on this topic, having been approached by London Live in December 2015 to provide comment on progress made after new data emerged. Police and community engagement 4.13 Safer Neighbourhood Boards (SNBs) were set up with the aim of improving the quality and consistency of community-police engagement across London. The Committee examined the proposals to introduce SNBs, as a replacement for Community and Police Engagement Groups. The Committee’s report, published in August 2013, was informed by a public meeting where MOPAC was criticised for providing inadequate, or contradictory, information to stakeholders about the basic functions of SNBs, how they will be governed, and their role within the current borough policing structures. The report set out a series of questions about the responsibilities that MOPAC wanted SNBs to fulfil, and called for clearer guidance. 4.14 The Committee reviewed the development of SNBs at its meeting in September 2015.