West Mercia 2015
Read more about West MerciaThis is HMIC’s second assessment of the effectiveness, efficiency and legitimacy with which West Mercia Police keeps people safe and reduces crime. PEEL (police effectiveness, efficiency and legitimacy) gives you information about how your local police force is performing in several important areas. It does this in a way that is comparable both across England and Wales, and year-on-year.
The extent to which West Mercia Police is effective at keeping people safe and reducing crime requires improvement.
The extent to which West Mercia Police is efficient at keeping people safe and reducing crime is good.
The extent to which West Mercia Police is legitimate at keeping people safe and reducing crime requires improvement.
HMI's observations
This year, for the first time, we have assessed leadership across the force. The assessment has led to a narrative rather than graded judgment, which is summarised below.
Read more about my assessment of West Mercia Police’s performance this year, including where I would like to see improvements next year.
I am satisfied with some aspects of the performance of West Mercia Police in keeping people safe and reducing crime, but there are also areas in need of improvement in order to provide a consistently good service.
While our inspections have revealed some concerns about the performance of West Mercia Police in keeping people safe and reducing crime, I am pleased to see that the alliance with Warwickshire Police has helped both forces to operate more efficiently.
The force is good at preventing crime and anti-social behaviour, and works well with partner agencies. The investigations undertaken by the force are high-quality and well-supervised. I am pleased to see the force is addressing all of the issues raised in HMIC’s domestic abuse inspection in 2014, and the service it provides to victims is improving. However, I remain concerned about the way in which the force assesses the risks faced by domestic abuse victims. I am similarly concerned by the way the force assesses and responds to the risks faced by missing children. The understanding of and response to serious and organised crime is also in need of improvement.
I am impressed by the added resilience of the services provided to the communities of West Mercia and Warwickshire by the alliance with Warwickshire Police. The alliance is a major contributor to West Mercia Police being well prepared to face its future financial challenges. I am reassured by the comprehensive analysis of the changing nature of demands for services that is informing options for a future shared operating model.
Notwithstanding the concerns that I have about the force’s performance, I welcome the way in which the force has acknowledged and responded to the issues we have raised.
Description of force area
West Mercia Police provides policing services to the areas of Herefordshire, Shropshire, Telford and the Wrekin and Worcestershire. There are areas of deprivation and areas of affluence in West Mercia. Around 1.2 million people live in a predominantly rural setting. It has a number of relatively small urban areas that include the cities of Worcester, Hereford and Telford. The resident population is increased by university students and the large numbers who visit or travel through the area each year.
The proportion of areas in West Mercia that are predicted to present a very high challenge to the police is lower than the national average. These are characterised by social deprivation or a concentration of commercial premises (including licensed premises), and in some cases both. Providing services across the entirety of the force area is hindered by the size of the force area and the road network.
Working arrangements
The alliance with Warwickshire Police is the most extensive collaboration between forces in England and Wales. All resources below the level of chief constable and deputy chief constable are shared between both forces, with any savings also shared proportionately.
Effectiveness
In our effectiveness inspection, we judged West Mercia Police to require improvement in the way in which it keeps people safe and reduces crime. The force is good at preventing crime and anti-social behaviour, most notably by working effectively with partner agencies. The force investigates crime well and the standard of supervision is a strength. The way in which the force assesses the risk faced by domestic abuse victims and missing children requires improvement. Improvement is also required in how the force understands and responds to serious and organised crime. This is the first year HMIC has graded forces on their overall effectiveness so a year-on-year comparison is not possible.
Efficiency
West Mercia Police is well prepared to face its future financial challenges. It has achieved notable increases in efficiency and improved resilience through its alliance with Warwickshire Police, which has allowed it to minimise the impact of reductions in spending on frontline policing. It has also achieved more savings than required over the previous spending review period. In last year’s value for money inspection, which considered how forces had met the challenge of the previous spending review period, West Mercia was also judged to be good.
Legitimacy
West Mercia Police is developing an ethical culture. However it has more to do to provide sufficient wellbeing and welfare support for its workforce, and to ensure that complaints and misconduct are properly assessed and free of bias.
The force understands the people it serves, but should improve the way that it communicates its engagement strategy to its workforce. The force is not complying with the Best Use of Stop and Search scheme and HMIC has a number of concerns about how West Mercia Police conducts and records instances of stop and search. The majority of Taser use by officers across the force is fair and appropriate.
This is the first time HMIC has graded forces on their legitimacy, so no year-on-year comparison is possible.
Leadership
West Mercia Police has clearly communicated its expectations of leaders. The force has worked well with Warwickshire Police to create a single vision for the alliance between the forces, which focuses on protecting people from harm. This vision is both embraced and communicated by both chief constables and chief officer teams.
We found that the workforce has a good understanding of the force’s expectations, priorities and plans for the future. The force had not agreed details of its future workforce model, for some understandable reasons. However it could have done more to address staff and officers’ concerns about job security. The force could also do more to ensure that it is identifying and developing talent, and should implement a more structured leadership programme, to provide better training and development.
Insights from other inspections
HMIC undertakes other inspections in addition to the PEEL programme. Since the last PEEL assessment there have been seven reports published on inspections that included West Mercia Police. More detail on some of these inspections can be found under the Other inspections section.
During our National Child Protection inspection, conducted earlier in the year, HMIC found that the force’s response to child protection was sometimes slow and its investigations were not always of the highest quality. We advised the force to ensure that staff undertaking child protection work are sufficiently skilled. I am pleased to note that when we re-visited the force in August, the force was making good progress addressing these issues and had increased the staffing levels within child protection teams and was the only force to completely clear its backlog of cases involving children that were awaiting assessment. The force, however, still has work to do to improve how it works with partner organisations to share information to protect children and effectively plan investigations.
Looking ahead to PEEL 2016
In the year ahead, I will be interested to see how the force responds to this assessment, along with the cause of concern and areas for improvement that HMIC has identified in the last year.
I will be particularly interested to see:
- improvements in the assessment of risk to victims of domestic abuse and missing and absent children, especially children in care;
- improvements in how the force responds to persistent missing children, especially children in care and conducts child protection investigations;
- compliance with Best Use of Stop and Search scheme;
- the outcome of the analysis of demands for services; and
- how the force uses its analysis of demands in developing a new joint operating model with its alliance partner, Warwickshire Police.
In May 2016, like the majority of forces in England and Wales, the force will see the second elections for its police and crime commissioner.
Effectiveness
How effective is the force at keeping people safe and reducing crime?
Last updated 18/02/2016
Overall West Mercia Police is judged to require improvement at keeping people safe and reducing crime.
The force is good at preventing crime and anti-social behaviour, most notably by working effectively with partner agencies. The force investigates crime well and standards of supervision are a strength. The way in which the force assesses the risk faced by domestic abuse victims and missing children requires improvement. Improvement is also required in how the force understands and responds to serious and organised crime. This is the first year HMIC has graded forces on their overall effectiveness so a year-on-year comparison is not possible.
West Mercia Police is good at preventing crime and anti-social behaviour. The force vision and values demonstrate a strong commitment to protecting people from harm and working in partnership, and these are generally well understood throughout the force. It ensures appropriate processes and resources are assigned to work effectively with partner organisations to tackle problems of concern for the community.
When a crime has occurred, the force acts quickly and carries out good quality investigations, and keeps victims informed about how their cases are progressing. However, better arrangements are needed to retrieve digital evidence from smartphones, tablets and other devices as this is delaying some investigations.
The force works well with others to divert offenders away from crime, and is effective at identifying, investigating and bringing to justice repeat and dangerous offenders to stop them re-offending.
West Mercia Police generally provides a good service in identifying vulnerable victims and responds appropriately with its partners. However, the approach to responding to vulnerable missing children and assessing the risks to domestic abuse victims is inconsistent and requires improvement.
The force needs to develop its understanding of the threats from serious and organised crime, including more effectively mapping new and emerging OCGs. Completion of local profiles, formal mapping of new groups as they emerge and greater involvement of local policing teams and partners will enhance the force’s understanding of threats posed to the public by serious and organised crime. This is an area that requires improvement.
The force has arrangements in place to ensure it can fulfil its national policing responsibilities.
Efficiency
How efficient is the force at keeping people safe and reducing crime?
Last updated 20/10/2015
HMIC found that West Mercia Police is well prepared to face its future financial challenges. It has achieved notable increases in efficiency and improved resilience through its alliance with Warwickshire Police, which has allowed it to minimise the impact of reductions in spending on frontline policing. It has also achieved more savings than required over the last spending review period. In last year’s value for money inspection, which considered how forces had met the challenge of the first spending review period, West Mercia was also judged to be good.
HMIC judges West Mercia Police to be good. The unique alliance with Warwickshire Police is the most extensive collaboration between forces in England and Wales. All resources below the level of chief constable and deputy chief constable are pooled and shared between both forces, with any savings also shared on a proportionate basis. This extensive collaboration has enabled both organisations to achieve budget reductions by operating more efficiently. Joint resources are used flexibly, providing added resilience that neither force could have afforded on their own.
The force is at an early stage of taking steps to better manage demand. Through its recent work to strengthen the alliance, it has carried out a comprehensive analysis of the changing demands on services faced by the two forces. This analysis also looked at the way the forces currently respond to demand. It has clearly shown that the current operating model will need to change to respond to both changing demands and reductions in budgets. The alliance is now well positioned to make progress in planning for the future.
Through the work in the alliance, the force has a good track record of controlling expenditure and achieving savings ahead of schedule. This has resulted in annual budget underspends, which have been set aside in reserves for future use. The longer term sustainability of the force’s finances is reliant upon a new model for policing being introduced across the alliance. Work is still underway to develop options for a future operating model.
Legitimacy
How legitimate is the force at keeping people safe and reducing crime?
Last updated 11/02/2016
HMIC found that West Mercia Police is developing an ethical culture. However it has more to do to provide sufficient wellbeing and welfare support for its staff, and to ensure that complaints and misconduct are properly assessed and free of bias.
The force understands the people it serves, but should improve the way it communicates its engagement strategy to staff. The force is not complying with the Best Use of Stop and Search scheme. HMIC has a number of concerns about how West Mercia Police conducts and records instances of stop and search.
This is the first time HMIC has graded forces on their legitimacy, so no year-on-year comparison is possible.
HMIC found that West Mercia Police clearly articulates the vision and values of the organisation and these values are having a positive influence on standards of behaviour and helping to develop an ethical culture.
The force acknowledges that it has been slow to put in place adequate provision to support the welfare and wellbeing needs of officers and staff. The force also recognises that existing governance arrangements for complaints and misconduct issues have not provided sufficient oversight to ensure that processes are consistent and free from any bias.
When HMIC looked at how well the force understands and successfully engages with all the people it serves, we found there is effective and in some cases innovative, engagement with the public and an understanding of its importance in maintaining police legitimacy. The force understands the people it serves but should improve the way it communicates its engagement strategy to staff. As a result, HMIC found that people were treated fairly and with respect by West Mercia Police and the force understands and engages well with the people it serves.
Stop and search and Taser are two ways that the police can prevent crime and protect the public. However, they can be intrusive and forceful methods, and it is therefore vital the police use them fairly and appropriately. HMIC found that the force is not complying with the Best Use of Stop and Search scheme, and needs to do more to make the public aware of the changes it has made and the information it has. However, HMIC has a number of concerns about how West Mercia Police conducts and record instances of stop and search. Too many records do not contain sufficient reasonable grounds to stop and search a person and these are not being sufficiently identified or addressed by supervisors. HMIC is satisfied that the majority of Taser use in West Mercia Police is both fair and appropriate.
Other inspections
How well has the force performed in our other inspections?
In addition to the three core PEEL pillars, HMICFRS carries out inspections of a wide range of policing activity throughout the year. Some of these are conducted alongside the PEEL inspections; others are joint inspections.
Findings from these inspections are published separately to the main PEEL reports, but are taken into account when producing the rounded assessment of each force's performance.
Leadership
Last updated 25/02/2016
As part of HMIC’s annual all-force inspections into police effectiveness, efficiency and legitimacy (PEEL) in 2015, HMIC assessed how well led forces are at every rank and grade of the organisation and across all areas inspected in PEEL. We reviewed how well a force understands and is developing its leaders; whether it has set a clear and compelling future direction; and how well it motivates and engages the workforce.
West Mercia Police has clearly communicated its expectations of leaders. The force has worked well with Warwickshire Police to create a single vision for the alliance between the forces, which focuses on protecting people from harm.
Encouragingly, HMIC found widespread understanding of the force’s expectations and future plans and priorities. While the force had not agreed details of its future workforce model, it could have done more to address staff and officers’ concerns about job security. The force could also do more to ensure that it is identifying and developing talent, and should implement a more structured leadership programme, to provide better training and development.
Other reports
Last updated 22/02/2016
This section sets out the reports published by HMIC this year that help to better understand the performance of West Mercia Police.
Key facts – 2019/20
Force Area
Population
Workforce
Victim-based crimes
Cost
Points of context provided by the force
West Mercia Police and Warwickshire Police have an alliance to meet the challenges of reduced budgets and continue to protect people from harm.
The changing profile of crime led to prioritising the protection of vulnerable people by increasing the resources and developing a new investigation team.
Police and crime plan priorities
Strategic aims:
- To ensure an efficient and effective police service is delivered
- To reduce crime and disorder
- To protect communities from harm
- To provide a strong and powerful voice for the people and victims of crime