Derbyshire PEEL 2016

Derbyshire Constabulary is good at preventing crime, tackling anti-social behaviour and keeping people safe. It understands its communities well and the threats they face. Safer neighbourhood teams operate well; staff are dedicated to recognising and managing issues of importance to their local community. The force regularly assesses changes in community composition and criminal behaviour to understand the nature of risk to the public.

The force has adopted a better approach to engaging with the public, moving away from formal meetings towards visiting all sections of the community at places they congregate in or go to for support. Through the role of the digital PCSO, the force has also achieved considerable success in broadening its engagement online into different parts of the community, specifically young people and others not comfortable or able to make direct contact with the police.

Police staff work alongside those from other agencies and there is co-ordination of problem-solving intervention and tactical activity at force and local level, although better use could be made of powers to deal with anti-social behaviour. Because the force does not use a common, problem-solving model or evaluation process, this impairs its ability to measure success and share learning points from operations.

Derbyshire Constabulary is good at investigating crime and reducing re-offending. The force is more successful than other forces in its pursuit of justice for victims, even when victims are too fearful or otherwise reluctant to support prosecutions.

Initial investigations are conducted well by response officers and subsequent investigations are generally of good quality and allocated appropriately among teams. However, PCSOs continue to be allocated crimes to investigate when they are not trained to do so. This creates a risk that the quality of investigations and service provided to victims will suffer. Investigations handed over to other units can be of variable quality with inconsistent supervision. Specialist support is good, particularly the provision of intelligence and digital investigation skills.

The force has maintained good levels of satisfaction among victims of crime and relatively few withdraw their support for police action during investigations. However, not enough victims are being offered the opportunity to make victim personal statements and not all staff comply with all aspects of the Code of Practice for Victims of Crime.

Clear and effective processes are in place across the force, built upon good partnership working, to manage suspects and offenders who present the highest risk to the public.

Derbyshire Constabulary is good at protecting those who are vulnerable from harm, and supporting victims. The force understands the nature and scale of vulnerability among the local community. Vulnerable victims are identified and assessed well by call-handlers, and the allocation of incidents to frontline staff is effective.

Frontline officers assess risk to an adequate standard, and the force is working to improve the overall quality of risk assessments.

The force did not provide data about arrests made during the course of domestic abuse investigations, but it is clear that positive action is taken during those investigations. The force is making good progress with its domestic abuse action plan. However the persistent use of the term ‘domestic violence’, rather than ‘domestic abuse’ should be addressed to ensure that staff understand that some domestic abuse is not physical.

The force makes an effective contribution to multi-agency work with external partner organisations, working closely with them to improve services. Two multi-agency safeguarding hubs (MASHs) have been created recently and they are functioning well. There has been a large growth in the use of multi-agency risk assessment conferences (MARACs) across all of Derbyshire and safeguarding is managed well by both neighbourhood and specialist staff.

Derbyshire Constabulary is outstanding at tackling serious and organised crime. The force uses innovative techniques and a strong partnership approach to understand the threat posed by serious and organised crime. Its strategic assessment considers current and emerging threats affecting the local community and is well informed by the force’s excellent links with foreign police officers, embassies and mediators from local communities. The force is in the process of updating its local profile and has introduced a supplementary document to summarise current threats and disruption activity that is used to brief partner agencies and frontline staff.

The force has a progressive approach to building intelligence, using many techniques and sources. Intelligence specialists work closely with partner agencies to understand new and emerging threats, prioritising those which exploit or import greatest vulnerability.

Organised crime groups are mapped and comprehensively managed in line with national guidance. All investigations are carefully monitored, with regular disruption activity carried out in co-operation with law enforcement and other partner agencies.

A ‘lifetime’ approach to offender management is taken, with all offenders subject to assessment and intervention before they are released from prison.

A wide variety of targeted prevention initiatives are conducted by multi-agency teams. These supplement the excellent use of social media to promote safety and awareness messages linked to serious and organised crime.

Derbyshire Constabulary has the necessary arrangements in place to ensure that it can fulfil its national policing responsibilities. Clear lines of accountability exist through to senior officer level. Threats are assessed well by specialist staff, with detailed problem profiles incorporating partner information where appropriate.

Robust systems and contingencies are in place to maintain the security of force IT systems. Hostile acts towards the force’s systems have been defeated and senior staff know how to respond to notifications of new threats.

The force is a fully committed and active participant in the local resilience forum and is routinely engaged in exercises and testing plans with other emergency services, local authority and military partner organisations.

The force’s armed policing strategic threat and risk assessment is compliant with College of Policing guidelines and the Home Office codes of practice. It uses all appropriate intelligence sources to assess threat and risk and was last reviewed in April 2016 in the wake of the terror attacks in Europe. Several exercises and training events have taken place in 2016 to test the force’s response to a marauding terrorist firearms attack, including with Nottinghamshire Police.