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Greater Manchester PEEL 2014

Effectiveness

How well the force tackles crime

Last updated 12/11/2014
Ungraded

Greater Manchester Police is good at reducing crime and preventing offending. The force requires improvement in investigating crime. It is good at tackling anti-social behaviour.

Greater Manchester’s effectiveness varies in its efforts to cut crime. Over the last four years recorded crime and victim-based crime both reduced more than across England and Wales as a whole. However, over the last twelve months, recorded crime has increased. Victim satisfaction is broadly in line with the England and Wales level. Partnership working, early intervention, and the management of offenders are strengths for the force.

The force is aiming to develop a consistent model and approach to reducing crime and preventing offending within its long-term change programme; this is a challenge, and the consistency of the service provided to the public in the short and medium term is not guaranteed. The force is taking a wider perspective on performance issues, which retains a focus on serious acquisitive crime while increasing the emphasis on safeguarding and vulnerability. Although there is a general understanding that safeguarding the victim is paramount, this change of focus is understood to varying degrees across the force.

The force is changing to a fully-integrated neighbourhood-based way of working to engage with communities and ensure credibility and legitimacy, and is working with partners on early intervention. This is a ten year transformation programme, taking it into 2020. The final step is to have a localised service – local policing for local people driven by local needs. The force knows it has some way to go before this is achieved fully.

In July 2014, HMIC reported that Greater Manchester understands the issues facing it, has an understanding of demand, and has a well-managed change programme in place. In September 2014, our interim assessment of how well the force cuts crime was carried out in the context of this long-term change process and its impact on how the force is able to deal with victims and cut crime.

Further insights on effectiveness

The domestic abuse inspection found significant concerns about the ability of Greater Manchester to deal consistently and appropriately with victims of domestic abuse and found serious weaknesses in staff’s understanding of their role and in the processes and systems in place to manage the risk to victims and keep them safe. The crime inspection and a follow-up inspection on domestic abuse found evidence that Greater Manchester Police had put in place a comprehensive response to previous concerns raised by HMIC, and early indications suggested that these changes were having a positive effect.

The crime inspection found that the top tier of organised crime groups was being managed centrally; however there is no force-wide consistent process for managing organised crime groups at lower tiers across the area.

The Strategic Policing Requirement inspection found that Greater Manchester had, or had access to through collaboration with other forces regionally, the necessary capability to tackle terrorism, civil emergency, serious organised crime and public disorder, but not a large-scale cyber incident.

Questions for Effectiveness

1

How effective is the force at reducing crime and preventing offending?

Good

The force currently has a high rate of crime; it knows that, if it continues doing what it has always done, then there will continue to be a high level of crime across Greater Manchester.

Over the last four years recorded crime and victim-based crime both reduced more than across England and Wales as a whole. However, over the last twelve months, recorded crime has increased. Victim satisfaction is broadly in line with the England and Wales level.

The force has established positive and very effective relationships with partner agencies. Across the partnership there is a strong focus on tackling the causes of crime, and the use of restorative justice and early interventions.

The force understands its demands and uses this information to make decisions on how resources are, or will be, allocated. Its continuous evaluation of harm, opportunity and threat on all levels is a strength.

The force has improved its ability to identify vulnerability at the point of initial contact by investing in training for control room staff.

 

2

How effective is the force at investigating offending?

Requires improvement

The integrated offender management scheme, in place to manage those offenders likely to cause most harm to communities, is well managed and effective.

HMIC found inconsistencies exist in the supervision of investigations and in investigation plans. The lack of capacity in the serious sexual offences unit has a negative impact on the ability of the force to deal with serious sexual assaults.

Learning and development is a strength at a strategic level; training and continuous professional development are inconsistent for frontline staff.

 

3

How effective is the force at tackling anti-social behaviour?

Good

The force gathers information from a range of sources for anti-social behaviour and is improving its ability to identify repeat victims.

At a strategic and partnership level, tackling anti-social behaviour is effective.

For frontline staff, their ability and capacity to keep in touch with their neighbourhood is perceived to be poor. Regular and protracted abstractions from their neighbourhoods make them feel that they are spending less time than they would like in their core roles.

 

4

How effective is the force at protecting those at greatest risk of harm?

Ungraded

The domestic abuse inspection found significant concerns about the ability of Greater Manchester Police to deal consistently and appropriately with victims of domestic abuse, and to reduce the risk of harm to them. The inspection found serious weaknesses in staff’s understanding of their role, and in the processes and systems in place to manage the risk to victims and keep them safe. The focus was on dealing with the offenders, and there was insufficient attention paid to safeguarding the victims.

The crime inspection and a follow-up inspection on domestic abuse found evidence that Greater Manchester Police had put in place a comprehensive response to previous concerns raised by HMIC, and early indications suggested that these changes were having a positive effect. The inspection also reviewed Greater Manchester’s domestic abuse action plan and found that the plan was comprehensive and outlined activity that was in line with agreed national priorities. There was also a detailed set of activity supporting the specific recommendations in the HMIC inspection.

5

How effective is the force at tackling serious, organised and complex crime?

Ungraded

The chief constable understood his role as specified in the Strategic Policing Requirement. Greater Manchester Police had assessed the scale and nature of the terrorism, civil emergency, serious organised crime and public disorder threats, but not that of a large-scale cyber incident. This had enabled the force to identify how much resource it needed to manage and respond to these threats, with the exception of a large-scale cyber incident. Public order has a nationally agreed requirement for resources and Greater Manchester is able to provide the necessary agreed amount.

The inspection found that Greater Manchester had, or had access to through collaboration with other forces regionally, the necessary capability to tackle terrorism, civil emergency, serious organised crime and public disorder, but not a large-scale cyber incident.

Greater Manchester was able to operate effectively with other police forces and emergency services to respond to public disorder and chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear incidents.

In Greater Manchester HMIC found that connectivity with other forces was effective for responding to terrorism, civil emergency, serious organised crime and public disorder, but not large-scale cyber incidents.

6

How effective is the force at meeting its commitments under the Strategic Policing Requirement?

Ungraded