Information
Police Assurance & Accountability Meeting – 15th January 2025
| POLICE ASSURANCE & ACCOUNTABILITY MEETING
Minutes |
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| 15th January 2025 | |
| Welcome and introductions.
Attendees:
DS welcomed everyone to the meeting. Apologies were accepted from A/CC Ivan Balhatchet. DS updated on the outcome of the Chief Constable recruitment process that concluded on Friday 10th January. She is delighted to confirm that A/CC Ivan Balhatchet is her preferred candidate. The appointment is subject to a confirmation hearing. This will take place on Monday 27th January. |
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| Previous minutes and action log
Outstanding actions from the Action Log have been updated. |
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| Part 1 | |
| Performance Review
Matters already notified to the Chief Constable for discussion. ASB repeat callers and satisfaction. A/ACC Adam Ward provided an update. Hold a regular bi-monthly performance meeting on ASB. The spike in October was the result of work done in town centre locations following repeated reports of ASB linked to a number of individuals. These individuals have been identified and the Force are working with their families and using CPNs. As a result, repeat incidents are declining. Work continues to sort out issues in Corby and Northampton specifically. Action – AW to provide an update on what activities are planned in the summer and share with DS. The trend in repeat callers for ASB has increased over the past 12 months and from the graph provided, continues on an upward trajectory. AW confirmed the upper control limit was breached in the autumn but has since seen a rapid decline following NPT intervention. AT commented that ASB also includes litter and noise and this is being tasked via the right care, right person approach. Not all ASB is police demand and here are often social issues linked to the behaviour. Assurance Statement: The Commissioner was assured by the observations by A/ACC Ward that the Force had already identified the concerns she had about repeat callers and had implemented some actions to try to address this. She expressed some concerns that this appeared to have been a long terms trend in increased callers, but the Force informed her that the data was influenced largely by increased demand at Corby and that this had been resolved and were confident that this matter was now under control. The Commissioner stated that she looked forward to seeing sustained reduced levels of ASB repeat callers following the assurances she was being provided with, coupled with increased levels of victim satisfaction. DA Investigations A/ACC Emma James provided an update. Restructure has taken place to provide enhanced support for DA investigations, With an additional 12 PCs/DCs going to the DAIU and a further 6 PCs focussed on disruption. Within first week of operating, the team have already secured charges for breaches of orders such as DVPN. Project Sherlock – improving standard of DA investigations. Children and adult portfolios have been split at Force vulnerability meetings and level to allow a sharper focus on risk issues. These changes have been made as the Force recognised that performance was not where it should be. Arrest rate last month was 36% . The rolling rate is 42.1% which is just above the national average. Whilst arrest rates indicate a level of grip, victim satisfaction rates are an equally important measure to monitor performance. There was a discussion about the use of community resolutions in the form of Out Of Court Disposals. The Force was heavily criticised by HMICFRS in the last inspection for the use of these so are now pushing for arrest when appropriate. Arrest can trigger support, or a protection notice which is then recorded as a positive action. Positive outcome rates are currently 8.7%. The national average 9.7%. Use of DVPNs and DVPOs have high application rate – Northants is second nationally. DA conviction rates have deteriorated – judicial backlogs are a major reason for this decline. MK advised that she will be interested to see what difference is made in the next 12 months as a result of the actions taken. MK also asked if the Force will have a DA expert in the force control room EJ confirmed that the FCR already has IDVAs at the weekend and have just agreed to take part in a national pilot for DA in FCR. EJ confirmed that she is not satisfied with the current positive outcome rate but the huge investment in DA investigations is not yet realising benefits yet. New team only fully staffed a week ago. The Force is also trialling GoodSAM – a 12-month pilot of a web application that enables improved communication options with the public. Virtual officer attendance at DA. Now that the new DA team is up and running, all high-risk DA will be managed by them. Medium and standard DA cases will stay with response. Performance with medium and standard cases should improve given high-risk cases are now escalated to the DA team; accepting that this is a smaller cohort of offenders. Assurance Statement: The Commissioner received some explanations from the Force about the reasons and background for poor DA investigation results ranging from arrest rates through positive outcomes and conviction rates. She was further updated about the improvements expected following the full staffing of the new DAIU. Given their focus on High Risk cases, she questioned how this will make a difference overall. ACC James explained that the concept was that by removing more high risk matters from elsewhere in the Force, this would create additional time and space for other teams to address these concerns. The Commissioner whilst welcoming the new initiatives stated that she looked forward to improvements over the next 6 months. |
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| Part 2 | |
| Final budget proposals
Following the initial December discussions relating to the Northamptonshire Police budget requirements for the financial year 2025/2026, the Commissioner requires a formal paper that sets out, as a result of these discussions the final requested budget requirements for Northamptonshire Police and to include any reworked investment proposals and savings plans. The 2025/26 budget requirement was taken as read with NA providing some additional commentary on a few minor changes since December.
Action – JB to reinvite Zoe Wilkinson to visit the Force. Zoe is the Deputy Director, for Neighbourhood Policing within the Home Office and previous engagement with her has proved to be beneficial. NNC have declared a surplus on business rates which provides an addition £650k in revenue. This will ease some of the budgetary pressures. Still waiting for collection rate information from WNC. Fees and charges for Firearms licences are increasing (full cost recovery) which will provide additional and welcomed revenue when it comes into force. Positive changes to event management costs recovery will also be helpful, particularly with large events such as the Silverstone Grand Prix where full costs are not recovered. There is also the opportunity to bid for additional neighbourhood resource funding however details about how to do this won’t be known until the Spring. Assurance Statement: The Commissioner thanked all that had made a contribution to getting the budget position paper to where it was in what had been difficult circumstances and times. The Commissioner agreed the budget proposals as set out in the paper. |
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| AOB
DS requested that a discussion on EMSOU be added to a future Problem-Solving meeting. Action – PF to add EMSOU discussion to a future problem-Solving meeting. No further business was raised |
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