Northumbria PEEL 2016

Northumbria Police is judged to be good in relation to how well it understands the current and likely future demand for its services.

Northumbria Police has a good understanding of current demand and has taken active steps to reduce front-end demand. The force is taking steps to identify hidden demand and is achieving this through established processes involving minority communities. The force encourages staff to find ways of reducing unnecessary demand through innovation. ‘Change in a day’ and ‘Quick wins’ are just two of the initiatives that the force has implemented. Northumbria Police has taken steps to assess future demand from emerging and changing crime types, and the implications of this for the force.

The force has worked with partner agencies to explore ways to make working arrangements more efficient and effective. But HMIC believes the force could do more to understand the impact of reduced budgets on partner agencies and the likely implications for demand on the force.

Northumbria Police uses its resources well to manage current demand. Its understanding of this demand ensures that it allocates resources appropriately, and in line with priorities, to match demand and keep pace with financial requirements. The force has a good understanding of its workforce skills and uses this information effectively to identify and fill gaps in capability. There is a comprehensive training plan that is linked to an awareness of future requirements.

However, HMIC has some concerns that the force has not fully considered enhancing its capacity and capability to meet the rising demands from cyber-crime. The force is keen to increase collaborative working and has a clear strategy as to how it will achieve this. It already links with other police forces, partner organisations and blue light agencies, and it is able to show savings and improved service provision as a result of joint working. However, its approach to evaluating the benefits from the change programme systematically is not consistent.

Northumbria Police has established plans to enable it to manage future demand. It has financial plans that align well with force priorities and it can therefore target resources at areas of policing that have the greatest risk. Workforce planning needs to become more advanced to ensure that there is a clear and sound basis for moving staff into areas of greatest demand and that all areas of policing across the organisation are appropriately staffed.

The force has a comprehensive information communication technology strategy that should help in service provision and achieving efficiencies. HMIC does, however, have concerns that the current in-force capability to implement this strategy is limited. The force does have plans to seek external specialist support and also plans to recruit individuals into the organisation who will support the strategy, but at this stage there are no timescales as to when this will take place.

The force has considered various ways to generate income and has identified both the sale of estate and the rise of the council tax precept. It is already involved in collaboration and partnership agreements across the range of the police service, partner agencies and other emergency services. Additional work is under way to explore other avenues of collaboration to further enhance policing services and maximise efficiency savings.