Greater Manchester 2018/19

Greater Manchester Police requires improvement in the way it reduces crime and keeps people safe.

The force should improve how it tackles crime and anti-social behaviour. It doesn’t have enough officers to carry out preventative activity, but is working to address this. The force should monitor how often it uses neighbourhood officers on other duties. This would ensure they have enough time to solve problems in their own wards.

The force should also improve how it investigates crime. It doesn’t always supervise investigations well enough. The force sometimes responds to high demand by downgrading incidents, resulting in delays. These delays can cause victims to disengage from the investigation, resulting in fewer positive outcomes.

Greater Manchester Police requires improvement in the way it protects vulnerable people. The force doesn’t have a clear process for deploying specialist investigators when interviewing vulnerable victims. This means vulnerable victims don’t always get support right away. In our 2017 effectiveness inspection, we were concerned about the way the force responds to vulnerable people at risk. This meant that evidence might be lost and victims put at risk.

In 2017 we also recommended the force ask victims of domestic abuse about their experience. It hasn’t done this yet. We recommend the force extends how it assesses vulnerable people at first point of contact. It always assesses people who call about sexual offences and hate crime. But it may not assess the vulnerability of other callers, particularly when its control room is dealing with high demand for service.

In 2016, we judged Greater Manchester Police outstanding at tackling serious and organised crime.