Essex PEEL 2016

Essex Police has a clear and well-established vision and values which are in line with the Code of Ethics and which help to ensure fairness and respect are understood across the workforce. The force is good at identifying and understanding issues that might undermine confidence and satisfaction, including encouraging those identified as having less trust and confidence in the police to express their views and works hard to improve as a consequence. The force uses a wide variety of media to communicate with the public about those issues that have an impact on negative and positive perceptions and experiences. Its use of social media is particularly strong. Lessons learned are shared widely and are used to inform training. Despite these arrangements, the victim satisfaction rate with overall treatment for the force remains lower than the England and Wales average. However, the force continues to strive to improve. A scrutiny of its stop and search process by independent panels, including a youth panel is mature and provides evidence of the force’s determination to gain a good understanding of issues that are of concern to its communities.

Vetting processes are good and proactive work is taking place. While there is a vetting backlog, the force has a reasonable plan to deal with the issue, including an escalation process to minimise risk. The force provides up-to-date details of disapproved officers to the College of Policing on a regular basis. Acceptable and unacceptable behaviours are continually emphasised and clarified for the workforce, underpinned by training that includes ethical dilemmas. While the force has a corruption control strategy it requires further development to be effective but nonetheless the force is effective at identifying threats to the integrity of the organisation. However, although the force has the ability to review and manage organisational risks it has more work to complete before it can satisfactorily review and manage all such risks. The force has a good understanding of the scale and source of the problem of abuse of authority for sexual gain and is proactive and determined in its approach to dealing with this issue. The force engages positively with the public and its own workforce regarding the outcomes of misconduct and corruption cases.

In our 2016 national overview of police legitimacy, we recommended that all forces should have started to implement a plan to achieve the capability and capacity required to seek intelligence on potential abuse of position for sexual gain. In 2017, we reviewed of the plans put in place by all forces to in response to this recommendation.

Abuse of position assessment – Essex Police

Essex Police seeks regularly the views of and challenge from its workforce, including volunteers by staff surveys, although the actions taken in response to surveys could be publicised more swiftly. Ideas are welcomed from the workforce and fair play advisers are available to support officers and staff who need advice and guidance around issues of unfairness. The force has a clear focus on wellbeing that is perceived to be authentic by the workforce, including good plans and governance arrangement. The force has a demonstrably open and positive approach to supporting lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender staff and officers within the workforce.

The chief constable and police and crime commissioner have signed the mental health charity MIND’s ‘Blue Light, Time to Change’ pledge by which the force will seek to challenge the stigma surrounding mental health. The provision of wellbeing training such as ‘Feel well, Live well’ is very positive.

The force has a personal performance arrangement in place but the use and quality of these is mixed. The performance improvement unit provides an excellent support service on performance and attendance issues.