Lancashire PEEL 2017

Lancashire Constabulary is good at treating all the people it serves with fairness and respect. Constabulary leaders demonstrate the value and benefits of procedural justice and the current arrangements equip the workforce with this knowledge. The importance of treating people with fairness and respect is understood widely. The constabulary provides training so that the workforce can recognise and overcome unconscious bias. Although not all the workforce has undergone such training, understanding of this subject is good. Training and scrutiny of use of force are good, and the constabulary complies with the national recording standard. The constabulary has effective processes for the internal monitoring and external scrutiny of stop and search, to understand the extent to which the workforce treat people well – and improve it.

Lancashire Constabulary is good at ensuring that its workforce behaves ethically and lawfully. Leaders regularly clarify and reinforce acceptable and unacceptable behaviour and the constabulary has a credible plan to complete all re-vetting over the next 18 months. The constabulary has a specific structure of ethics committees to which decisions involving ethics may be referred. The constabulary has accessible policies and rigorous procedures that comply with the constabulary’s equality duty and reflect the Code of Ethics. The workforce receive adequate and relevant training on the code, which is embedded within the workforce’s culture and working practices. The workforce have a good general understanding and awareness of discrimination.

The constabulary’s website contains detailed information on how to make a complaint. It provides appropriate support for those with disabilities or language difficulties to register a complaint. Information is available in areas of police stations facing the public, providing guidance on the complaints procedure. Complaints containing allegations of discrimination are identified properly. However, there are inconsistencies in the quality of investigations into discrimination allegations and in the timeliness and quality of updates to complainants. We are disappointed to find a lack of awareness among some local staff of their responsibility to deal with complaints that may contain allegations of discrimination.

Lancashire Constabulary is committed to treating its staff with fairness and respect. However, it needs to do more to ensure that this is consistently applied at all leadership levels. Since our 2016 legitimacy inspection, the constabulary has made progress in some areas. It continues to offer ways for officers and staff to provide feedback to leaders, which the workforce trust and value. It has carried out work to identify disproportionality in recruitment, retention, progression and allegations of wrongdoing, and is taking action to address the problems identified. Senior leaders are committed to improving the wellbeing of the workforce and have introduced wellbeing ambassadors and dedicated leads for wellbeing in each BCU, alongside a range of wellbeing services. The chief constable has produced a series of video presentations to improve the workforce’s awareness and understanding. However, understanding and commitment are less evident at lower levels of management and the result is that some of the workforce do not feel that their wellbeing is seen as a priority. One cause of this may be the lack of effective training for managers on a meaningful, consistent individual performance management process, which supports development, performance and wellbeing. If the constabulary resolves this problem, it could improve the workforce’s perception of their treatment.

The constabulary has mechanisms to identify talented individuals, but this approach is not consistent and the emphasis remains on line managers identifying talent. The constabulary has made good use of national schemes such as Police Now and direct entry to increase the diversity of its leadership teams and ensure it has the skills to meet future needs. It has revised the promotion process to make it fairer, and recognises the need to communicate this change.