Metropolitan PEEL 2016

The Metropolitan Police Service is good at understanding its current and likely future demand. The force analyses the pressure on its services to help understand what causes demand, and has used data from other bodies such as the National Health Service to get a broader picture so that it can discuss with them how to manage demand created inadvertently or demand on the force which would be better handled elsewhere. It also has many initiatives to prevent crime.

The force is working with the public to obtain their views of the force and understand their expectations of its services. It is also using work it has done to understand emerging demand and hidden crime to help plan its response.

The Metropolitan Police Service requires improvement in how well it uses its resources to manage current demand. There are some clear positives: the force has largely been successful in meeting the priorities set in the Mayor of London’s police and crime plan 2013–16, and has started to increase resources to protect vulnerable people. The force allocates resources to meet demand on a monthly basis against its risk, threat and harm assessment, and reviews resources daily in response to changes in demand.

The force responds to calls to service based on risk, threat and harm factors, but it could do more to manage demand, and to assess the solvability of a crime on first attendance. It has carried out analysis that provides a baseline of where it invests its resources in terms of workforce and financial costs. This analysis and its workforce plan have helped the force understand where the gaps are, and it has taken steps to fill them. But shortages remain in investigation and business analysts.

The force has not prioritised collaboration, and is unlikely to do so unless there is political support. However, it does work operationally with other agencies to manage demand effectively. It plans further joint working with blue light emergency services. ICT projects have seen inefficiencies; the force has learnt from previous mistakes, and current change programmes will be subject to professional benefits identification before being started.

The Metropolitan Police Service is good at planning for demand in the future. The force’s medium-term financial strategy sets out its savings requirements until 2020. It has detailed plans for all elements of the change portfolio and a process to oversee progress. Plans in the change portfolio and other major programmes undergo scrutiny to ensure their credibility before being presented to the Mayor.

The force has ambitious plans for its future use of ICT, which it sees as a way to support other changes. Several ICT projects are in progress or are due to start imminently, but it is too soon to see their effects. The force’s financial plans appear to be sustainable. Forecasts show that savings of £390m are required between 2016/17 and 2019/20. The force is committed to making savings of £290m over this period, proposing changes in areas such as its estate, technology and local policing functions to achieve savings for reinvestment. The remaining £100m of savings are largely dependent on the delivery of the force’s ICT plans, which are still being developed, so are not yet included in the force’s budget. The force’s plans will be subject to scrutiny by HMIC in 2017.

The force has identified a shortage of business analysts and project managers with experience of working on large-scale change programmes, including carrying out benefits identification and review. The force recognises the risks of weak analysis, and is not including anticipated savings in its financial plans until it has tested the operational impact.

The force is also now working on its change portfolio with a single management consultancy. A principal element of this new partnership is that skills and knowledge will be transferred back to the force. Generally, the force has less to gain from collaborating with other police forces. Work is underway to develop existing collaboration arrangements, but progress has slowed pending clarification of the new Mayor’s priorities.