Agenda and minutes

Please see note (a) at the end of the agenda.

No declarations of interest were received.

To receive a verbal update from the PCC on current activity.

3.1       PCC Chris Nelson provided a verbal update on activities since the previous meeting and members noted the following points:

·         The HMICFRS improvement plan remained the key issue for the constabulary.

·         There had been a number of senior leadership changes over the last few months with each person bringing new qualities to the force and helping on its journey out of the engage phase.

·         Safer Streets had resulted in an extra £3m into the county since 2021. Safer Street 4 focuses, specifically for Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB), Rural Crime, and Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG). Gloucestershire had performed the best in the country in terms of successfully biding for the most money per head of population.

·         The funding will go towards:

o   7 new police community PSCOs

o   The roll out of Project Solace (directed at tackling ASB)

o   A new drone fleet for rural operations, as well as 32 rural ANPR systems to help track serious and organised criminals moving across the county

o   Recruitment to run the Community Trigger Scheme

o   Personal safety apps and alarms; and

o   new drug testing machines, which had been highly effective in tackling drink spiking etc.

·         The next round of Safer Streets funding was due to be announced soon.

·         Gloucestershire was the first force in the world to use forensic science as a weapon against dog theft. Other forces had now begun to follow suit, which was the best way for the scheme to be successful.

·         Another country first was the rollout of Odyssey, which was a system used to provide real time examination of a rape victim’s phone. At the moment victims could be without their phone for months, just at the time when they needed support from their social circle.

·         This technology allowed trained officers to interrogate the phone based on what the victim themselves felt was incriminating evidence against the perpetrator.

·         Operation Scorpion continued to be success (forces joined across the Southwest to deal with illicit drug dealing). The third operation was due in November and would aim to tackle recreational drugs within the night-time economy.

·         A programme of homes built by prisoners for local communities continued. This was aimed at allowing prisoners the opportunity to build up skills and earn money in preparation for their release, and also providing communities with genuinely affordable home solutions.

·         The Gloucestershire ASB pledge had been signed by partners, led by Safer Gloucestershire, to improve the coordination of authorities handling ASB.

·         The second part of the joint Community Speedwatch Fund with GCC, aimed at helping to fight persistent speeding, would be launched later this month.

·         ‘Find your Voice’ video had been launched to raise awareness of bystanders speaking out against violence and intimidation against woman and girls: https://www.gloucestershire-pcc.gov.uk/men-asked-to-findyourvoice-in-new-campaign-to-tackle-violence-against-women/

·         The first volunteer PSCO training course had been launched, the force hoped to develop their parish constable concept soon and they were on track to meet the uplift for PCs, 153 officers over 3 years.

·         The Commissioner was due to have a governance meeting tomorrow  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.

To review progress made on the HMICFRS improvement plan.

The 2021/22 PEEL inspection report can be viewed here.

4.1       The Chair invited Richard Ocone to provide an update on the HMICFRS improvement plan. Members noted the following:

• Members were reminded that the PEEL review was a biannual inspection process which examined police force performance. The review then led to a decision as to whether the force needed to go into the engage phase. 6 forces, including Gloucestershire, were currently required improvement but it could be more by the end of the national PEEL process.
• Gloucestershire has had two monitoring meetings so far this year (March and July) which were attended by the Chief Constable and PCC and led by the Chief Inspector of constabularies. The presentation for today was the one given in the July monitoring meeting (but with updated statistics).
• The Constabulary had been meeting and liaising with other forces who had received outstanding ratings for peer learning and seeing what best practise looked like in particular areas.
• Agreement had been given to proceed with implementing the new record management system Niche.
• The graphics on slide 2 showed the recent success of three Vanguard operations.
• The PEEL inspection identified 5 causes of concern which then resulted in 9 pillars of improvement needed within the constabulary, which were outlined on slide 3.
• The Force Control Room linked into 3 of the 5 areas of concern. It had historical staffing issues, which were heavily impacted during Covid and a failure to future proof and plan. As well as an increase in demand and IT stability issues.
• There was now a wraparound governance structure in place, staffing had reached 97.3fte (when taking into account the 5 police officers) and was projected to be reaching new levels of overall staffing by next year (PCC has funded to new baseline of 123.59 FTE)
• The stability of IT remained an issue but was moving in the right direction, once systems were reliable, the force would then look at moving into a transformation stage e.g., exploring the use of live chats and more advanced technologies.
• Effectiveness and efficiency were also being improved with new leadership models, better training, and demand management. The team were carrying out triage to ensure cases were reaching the right allocations, and not being escalated unreasonably.
• A Partnership Demand Board had been created to focus on what policing was there for: preventing and detecting crime, keeping the peace and protecting/saving life. A lot of the forces demand was increasingly resulting from ineffective response from other partners (particularly in the protecting/saving life area) which meant resource was constantly being diverted away from the other areas, particularly investigating crime.
• The force was found as performing inadequately in 2019 and 2021 on recording crime. The inspection found it was 86.6% compliant with national guidelines and timeliness remained an issue (a crime should be recorded within 24 hours of being reported). The rules on this are specifically set out in the National Crime Recording Standards (NCRS). Things were improving in this area and would continue to do so now the new system of recording  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.