In 2023–2025, we carried out a PEEL inspection of Greater Manchester Police. PEEL stands for police efficiency, effectiveness and legitimacy.
We inspected how well the force performed in several areas of policing. Most of these areas were then graded as outstanding, good, adequate, requires improvement or inadequate.
Find out more about Greater Manchester Police
More information about the PEEL assessments
Our inspection assessed how good Greater Manchester Police is in 9 areas of policing. We make graded judgments in 8 of these 9 as follows:
We also inspected how effective a service Greater Manchester Police gives to victims of crime. We don’t make a graded judgment in this overall area.
We set out our detailed findings about things the force is doing well and where the force should improve in the rest of this report.
We also assess the force’s performance in a range of other areas and we report on these separately. We make graded judgments for some of these areas.
In 2014, we introduced our police efficiency, effectiveness and legitimacy (PEEL) inspections, which assess the performance of all 43 police forces in England and Wales. Since then, we have been continuously adapting our approach.
We have moved to a more intelligence-led, continual assessment approach, rather than the annual PEEL inspections we used in previous years. Forces are assessed against the characteristics of good performance, set out in the PEEL Assessment Framework 2023–2025, and we more clearly link our judgments to causes of concern and areas for improvement.
It isn’t possible to make direct comparisons between the grades awarded in this PEEL inspection and those from the previous cycle of PEEL inspections. This is because we have increased our focus on making sure forces are achieving appropriate outcomes for the public, and in some cases we have changed the aspects of policing we inspect.
Our reports contain references to, among other things, ‘national’ definitions, priorities, policies, systems, responsibilities and processes.
In some instances, ‘national’ means applying to England or Wales, or England and Wales. In others, it means applying to England, Wales and Scotland, or the whole of the United Kingdom.
I am pleased with some aspects of Greater Manchester Police’s performance in keeping people safe, reducing crime and providing victims with an effective service. I am satisfied with most other aspects of the force’s performance, but there are areas in which it needs to improve.
The funding of Greater Manchester Police is in line with the England and Wales average. The force receives 25 percent of its funding from precept, which is lower than the England and Wales average.
Greater Manchester Police has a higher level of recorded incidents per 100,000 population compared with the England and Wales average. And the force receives a higher number of emergency 999 calls per 1,000 population than the England and Wales average. The force answers most of those calls quickly, and it also assesses the level of risk appropriately.
Since our last inspection in 2021, the force has continued to improve the policing service it provides to the communities of Greater Manchester. Because of this, it has made progress in most areas of improvement from our last inspection and achieved improved judgment grades. But the force recognises that there is still work to do, and I have identified areas in which it needs to improve.
There has been significant investment in the force contact, crime and operations (FCCO) centre. My inspection found improvements in call handling and how the force assesses risk as part of its response to the public. A new graded response policy makes sure that the force prioritises its calls for service. However, the force is aware that it doesn’t attend incidents that are assessed as requiring a one-hour response promptly enough.
I was pleased to find an improvement in the overall management of criminal investigations. The force has invested in its governance and performance processes to improve and maintain the quality of its criminal investigations. Our victim service assessment found significant improvement in standards of investigation, victim care and investigation management. The force has recorded an increase in solved outcomes over the last 12 months. However, more improvements could be made to achieve better outcomes for more victims.
There is an improved understanding of how workforce well-being can be supported. For example, the force has reduced its workforce workload in many areas and provided a broad range of preventative support measures. The force has met its student officer uplift target and supports its student officers. It has trialled further support in some areas but needs to make sure student support is consistent. The force needs to continue to develop its understanding of how it can remove barriers to career progression and support under-represented groups. It should also continue to improve the effective use of its individual performance appraisals.
Our last inspection identified the chief constable’s positive changes and long-term plans. I am pleased that those plans have continued to help the force improve the service it provides to the public. Its leadership, governance and performance processes have increased both the productivity and proactivity of its officers.
Chief officers have made well-thought-out changes and investments to make sure the force has the resources to meet the public’s demands. The force’s leadership and management have significantly improved both its service to the public and outcomes for victims of crime.
My report sets out the more detailed findings of this inspection. There are still areas in which Greater Manchester Police needs to do better. However, I am optimistic that the force’s leadership and management will continue to provide further improvements.
HM Inspector of Constabulary
Using the College of Policing leadership expectations as a framework, in this section we set out the most important findings relating to the constabulary’s leadership at all levels.
The force’s investments and change plans align with its clear strategic plan. The force uses data and analysis to understand its current and future demand. It has reviewed its policing model and resources to meet the demand it faces.
The force’s structured governance and performance arrangements follow the strategic plan and force priorities. Through this, senior leaders are held to account for the productivity, proactivity and quality of the service. Our inspection showed improvements in the use of police powers, such as arrest and stop and search. We also found proactive problem-solving operations and improved quality of investigations.
The chief constable has increased the number of assistant chief officers within its enabling services leadership. These will improve efficiency and support the workforce. Officers and staff see the chief officer team at policing operations and roadshows. Chief officers reiterate force plans, investments and priorities. They also celebrate success and remind the workforce of its values and expected standards.
The force understands its leadership requirements and development needs. First-line managers support workforce well-being.
The force recognised an increasing loss of student officers. As a result, it has introduced a ‘stay team’, which has successfully retained both student officers and experienced members of the workforce. The force has also successfully attracted experienced skilled officers to specialist roles.
More detail on Greater Manchester Police’s leadership is included in the main body of the report.
The reducing crime assessment sets out what Greater Manchester Police is doing to reduce crime and how effective this action is. This assessment doesn’t include police-recorded crime figures. This is because they can be affected by variations and changes in recording policy and practice, making it difficult to make comparisons over time.
The force understands its current and future demand. It has invested in district prevention hubs. Working in partnership, they identify high-demand areas and problem-solves to reduce crime, antisocial behaviour and vulnerability.
The force has early intervention programmes to divert young and vulnerable people away from committing crime. The force has neighbourhood crime plans to reduce and detect crime. Good governance and performance arrangements evaluate the effectiveness of its problem-solving.
The force has improved the quality of its investigations, quality assurance investigation management and victim care. This has led to more positive outcomes for victims of crime.
The force has invested in more police officers as part of a new neighbourhood policing model. The model needs to mature, but neighbourhood teams are interacting with communities to better understand and meet their needs.
The force has improved its call handling, assessment of risk and responses to incidents. Call handlers advise callers on scene preservation and crime prevention. The force recognises that it needs to attend incidents requiring a one-hour response more quickly. Prompt attendance is required to safeguard victims and gather evidence.
Improvement is needed in stop and search training to make sure officers use and record stop and search effectively and appropriately.
More detail on what Greater Manchester Police is doing to reduce crime is included in the main body of the report.
This section describes our assessment of the service Greater Manchester Police provides to victims. This is from the point of reporting a crime and throughout the investigation. As part of this assessment, we reviewed 100 case files.
When the police close a case of a reported crime, they assign it an ‘outcome type’. This describes the reason for closing it.
We selected 100 cases to review, including at least 20 that the force had closed with the following outcome:
When a suspect hasn’t been identified and the victim declines or isn’t able to support further police action to identify the offender (outcome 14).
Although our victim service assessment is ungraded, it influences graded judgments in the other areas we have inspected.
The force has improved the time it takes to answer emergency calls and reduced the number of unanswered non-emergency calls that callers abandon. When it answers calls, it considers threat, harm, risk and vulnerability. It identifies repeat and vulnerable victims, which means that it is aware of the victim’s circumstances. Call handlers are polite and give victims advice on crime prevention and how to preserve evidence.
On most occasions, the force responds to calls for service appropriately and assesses risk to victims. It always informs victims of delays, which means that it meets victims’ expectations.
In most cases, the force carries out investigations quickly and completes relevant and proportionate lines of enquiry. The force supervises investigations well and regularly updates victims. Victims are more likely to have confidence in a police investigation when they receive regular updates.
A thorough investigation increases the likelihood of perpetrators being identified and arrested, providing a positive result for the victim. In all cases, the force takes victim personal statements, which give victims the opportunity to describe how crime has affected their lives.
When victims withdraw support for an investigation, the force considers progressing the case without the victim’s support. This can be an important method of safeguarding the victim and preventing further offences from being committed. In some cases, the force didn’t always record whether it considered using orders designed to protect victims, such as a Domestic Violence Protection Notice (DVPN) or Domestic Violence Order (DVPO).
The Code of Practice for Victims of Crime requires forces to carry out a needs assessment quickly to decide whether victims need additional support. The force usually carries out this assessment and records the request for more support.
The force closes crimes with the appropriate outcome type. It records a clear reason for using a certain outcome and this is effectively supervised. It seeks victims’ views when deciding which outcome type to assign to a closed investigation. However, it doesn’t always get an auditable record of the victim’s wishes when required. The force always informs victims of the outcome code assigned to the investigation.
Greater Manchester Police is adequate at using police powers and treating people fairly and respectfully.
The force lead for stop and search has developed a robust internal governance process to help it better understand and improve its use of this power.
Organisations that work with those who have experienced stop and search encounters with the police attend the force’s quarterly meetings. Members of the meeting include:
This broad membership provides a good insight into the experience and understanding of those who have been stopped and searched by the police in Manchester. It allows conversation and debate. For example, at one meeting we heard a discussion about how the force could receive feedback from those who had been stopped and searched. One panel member from a youth background suggested using QR codes to encourage feedback. These could be included within the record of the search or given at the time of the encounter. The lead was exploring this as an option to increase the feedback the force receives.
There are also external scrutiny panel members who have received training in police use of stop and search powers. They observe and provide real-time feedback on the use of police powers during pre-planned police operations and at public events.
During our inspection, we reviewed a sample of 194 stop and search records from 1 January to 31 December 2022. Based on this sample, we estimate that 75.3 percent (with a confidence interval of +/- 6.1 percent) of all stop and searches by the force during this period had reasonable grounds recorded. This is a decline compared to 90.3 percent (with a confidence interval of +/- 3.5 percent) of stop and searches in our review from 2020. Of the records we reviewed for stop and search on people from ethnic minorities, 34 of 50 had reasonable grounds recorded.
Officers should understand that they must record a detailed written explanation of why they thought the search was necessary. Supervisors who review records should be trained to assess whether the record is reasonable and to provide feedback where needed. The police use of stop and search is a valuable tool in preventing and detecting crime. However, if a force can’t show it uses stop and search fairly, there is a real risk to the public’s trust and confidence.
In this section we set out our main findings that relate to police powers and treating people fairly and respectfully.
The force has been proactive in increasing its use of stop and search powers. In the year ending 31 March 2023, it used stop and search powers on 30,310 occasions.
The force identified that it wasn’t using its powers under section 60 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 effectively. In 2021, it only authorised the use of section 60 powers twice. As a result, the force has provided training for all its authorising officers. Since then, it has seen the number of authorisations of section 60 powers increase from 36 in 2022 to 39 between January and July 2023. The stop and search lead officer reviews all section 60 authorisations to make sure that they are fair and appropriate. The increase shows the force’s commitment to using police powers to prevent and deter crime.
The force monitors its use of this power and publishes data on its website. The data informs the public of the number of stop and search encounters. It also includes the age bracket, gender and ethnicity of the subject stopped and searched. It provides the outcomes of the search, such as whether the article sought was found and what action the police officer took as a result. The force’s website provides members of the public with information on the stop and search process and their rights and responsibilities. It also describes how the force uses stop and search and seeks feedback from members of the public about their experiences of being stopped and searched.
The force analyses its stop and search data to understand how fairly its officers use the power. It uses this information to decide if the recorded grounds for the search are reasonable, how often the article sought was found and the outcome of the search.
Through its internal monitoring process, each policing district senior leadership team quality assures a number of stop and search records and reviews the body-worn video (BWV) of the encounters each month. The findings of the quality assurance process are discussed in the internal governance meeting to review force performance and identify themes from the audit. For example, the force has found that the BWV audio recording has a 30-second lag when switched on. This means that the start of a conversation between the officer and the person subject to the stop and search encounter may not be recorded. Officers are aware of this, and the force lead is working with national leaders on stop and search and BWV to find a solution.
The force told us that it makes an arrest from its use of stop and search 14 percent of the time. The positive outcome rate for its use of stop and search is 22 percent. In the year ending 31 March 2023, 62 people made a complaint against the force about its use of stop and search. This equates to 0.2 percent of the people who were subject to stop and search.
The force has 11 external scrutiny panels, which include members of the public. Panel members are trained in police use of stop and search and use of force powers. They review and scrutinise the records and BWV of stop and search encounters. The panels give their findings to individual officers and the force’s internal governance meeting to help improve the fair and effective use of these police powers.
The force has compared the recently released Census 2021 ethnicity data to the Census 2011 data. This has helped it understand how its use of stop and search powers may have a disproportionate effect on the population. The force found that its disproportionate use of stop and search in relation to the Black ethnic group had reduced from 3.7 to 2.1 times more likely to be searched. For the Asian ethnic group, this had reduced from 1.9 to 1.3 times more likely. Throughout England and Wales, the Black ethnic group is 4.8 times more likely, and the Asian ethnic group 1.6 times more likely to be searched.
The force has continued its mandatory refresher training for officer safety. This includes use of force tactics, communication skills and conflict management.
The force has improved its recording of the use of force. There is a clear policy on when force should be recorded and governance processes in place to prompt officers to complete recordings. For example, when officers attend the custody suite, they are reminded of their responsibility to record the use of force. Custody branch pacesetter meetings then check the recordings.
We can estimate how many use of force incidents there should be by looking at how many arrests a force has. Each arrest would usually count as a use of force. Therefore, the number of use of force incidents should be at least as high as the number of arrests. In the year ending 31 March 2022, Greater Manchester Police recorded 33,567 use of force incidents. This was a 108 percent increase compared with the previous year. This increase is likely to reflect an improvement in recording practices. However, based on the number of arrests, we estimate that the force under-recorded use of force by at least 7,199 incidents. In the year ending 31 March 2022, the force had 11.7 use of force incidents per 1,000 population, which is comparable to other similar forces.
In 2023, the force developed a mobile device application for recording use of force. This has improved the efficiency of and officer compliance with recording procedures. The force has published data on its use of force for the year ending 31 March 2023. This showed that it recorded 47,905 incidents when force had been used.
A senior officer leads the use of police powers meeting. The meeting considers police officer use of force, scrutiny and officer safety. It reviews incidents of police officers being attacked or assaulted and looks for ways to improve how its officers consider and use force. This will help to prevent attacks and assaults on its officers in the future. Use of force is looked at both internally and externally through the external scrutiny panels. BWV is reviewed and feedback is provided personally to officers and to the force so that it can consider how to improve officers’ use of force.
The force’s website publishes data on how officers use force. This informs the public on officers’ use of force tactics and the reasons for use, such as self-defence, to protect the public or to secure evidence. It also includes the age bracket, gender and ethnicity of the subject. The force told us that it received 250 complaints about the use of force in the year ending 31 March 2023, which equates to 0.5 percent of the incidents where force was used.
Greater Manchester Police is good at prevention and deterrence.
The force has developed a force prevention branch, along with a prevention hub in each of its policing districts. There is strong governance, performance and quality assurance oversight of force prevention and problem-solving activities. Police officers and police staff work with local partnership organisations to prevent and deter crime, antisocial behaviour and vulnerability. The prevention hubs evaluate their problem-solving plans by checking for a reduction in demand. They also apply a cost-benefit analysis to each plan.
The force prevention branch governs how the force prevents crime and reoffending. The prevention branch prepares force-level data for demand categories, profiles of demand at district level and the details of repeat callers. It also has a ‘design for security’ team that works across Greater Manchester with planning and design teams. Together they consider crime reduction and public safety in any construction or housing planning application.
The force has introduced activities to share good practice between district prevention hubs. It uses a peer review evaluation process and shares good operation practice both at force-level governance meetings and through a force IT platform.
Getting local communities involved improves communication between the force and the communities it serves. This improves the force’s understanding of the needs of its communities. It also provides community members with the ability to influence policing in their local areas and to set local priorities.
We found that the force had ongoing two-way discussions with its communities. However, we found that it could do more to try and work with some communities who traditionally interact less with the police and may have less trust and confidence.
In this section we set out our main findings that relate to prevention and deterrence.
The force has improved its problem-solving framework. This includes the structure, leadership, workforce and governance it has in place to fight, reduce and prevent crime, antisocial behaviour and vulnerability. The structure is based on force policy, such as its crime prevention strategy and a new antisocial behaviour policy. The force also works with the organisation ASB Help, a registered charity that provides support to victims of antisocial behaviour.
The district prevention hubs work with local partner community safety organisations. They review police and partner information to find areas of repeat crime and victimisation, antisocial behaviour and vulnerability, such as children who are repeatedly missing from home. Each hub has officers and staff to support high-demand and high-risk areas of policing. For example, they are co-located with district licensing officers, school engagement officers and missing from home co-ordinators. Together they can support problem-solving activities to prevent crime and antisocial behaviour and support vulnerable people.
Problem-solving activities are subject to a structured review process. Once complete, activities are subject to an evaluation of their effectiveness, including demand reduction and savings in police resources. Evaluations identify what has worked well and what practice can be shared with others.
Prevention hub teams use both police and partners’ information to reduce risk and repeat incidents. This work can be at force level, such as the proactive Operation Avro, which is a force operation to tackle crime within each district.
Operation Vulcan is a force-led partnership that tackles organised crime in Cheetham Hill by using the Clear, Hold and Build model. This has closed over 200 shops that were selling counterfeit goods, recovered over £400,000 in cash and taken over 400 tonnes of counterfeit goods, including clothing and medicines, off the streets. The force told us that it carried out 90 search warrants and arrested 160 people as part of this operation. This partnership approach has contributed to a 50 percent reduction in violent crime over 4 months.
The force’s prevention activity also supports early intervention to prevent offending and support those who may be at risk of becoming involved in crime. The prevention, prosecution, intervention, education and diversion scheme has shown that in Greater Manchester, a child is identified as the offender in nearly 15 percent of crimes. Of those children, 70 percent hadn’t received any intervention or diversionary support.
The scheme makes child offenders visible to support services and provides support to help prevent them from reoffending. A six-month review of the scheme in central Manchester showed that 56 referrals were made and 10 partners carried out interventions. The review found that the scheme offers good support and diversion for children and young people who are identified as needing early intervention to prevent offending.
The force recognises the need for a consistent approach to tackling neighbourhood crime. It has a tactical lead officer for all neighbourhood crime types. It has developed 4P plans (pursue, prevent, protect and prepare) to reduce crime, tackle offending and provide communities with information to keep them safe from crime. Operation Castle motivates the force’s approach to burglary offences. It provides officers with the standard of investigation and crime scene examination expected at incidents of burglary. Victims receive help, advice and information. To increase vigilance and crime prevention, officers tell local neighbours about the criminals that are operating in their community.
At a district level, the prevention hubs identify incidents that require a problem-solving approach and plan a response. For example, one problem-solving plan we viewed described a family relationship breakdown due to alcohol misuse and mental health issues, which resulted in domestic abuse. Many incidents were logged and there was evidence of repeated risk to the victim. The prevention hub arranged a meeting with local partners and service providers, including housing. Partners agreed to act to prevent further incidents and sought a civil injunction to prevent the perpetrator from going back to the address. The police agreed to use similar prevention orders and a DVPO should the injunction fail. Granting the order reduced the number of repeat incidents and helped keep the victim safe. When the perpetrator breached bail conditions, he was arrested and remanded into custody. The prevention hub maintained a plan to monitor the court case and release of the perpetrator. The plan increased the safety of the victim and reduced further offending and demand on police resources, which saved an estimated £91,000.
By using both police and partner data to identify issues, districts work with a range of organisations to solve them. For example, Operation Heartbeat tackled antisocial behaviour and robberies in the centre of Bury. The neighbourhood team worked with local businesses, local authority partners, schools and colleagues to interact with young people who go to the centre. The operation ran for 12 months until April 2023. It reduced both antisocial behaviour and associated crime within the area by more than 50 percent. Communities and local business employees reported feeling safer as a result.
The force has recently hosted a problem-solving reward and recognition ceremony, which celebrates the effective problem-solving work of its workforce and districts. Some problem-solving plans were also submitted for national awards. The force was shortlisted for three national awards that recognise problem-solving initiatives.
Chief officers carried out a review of its neighbourhood policing model, which included consultation with the communities of Manchester. This resulted in 264 more neighbourhood police officers and a new shift pattern to increase visibility within their communities. In addition, all its neighbourhood officers were given training and accreditation, and partnership prevention work was increased. The force has also introduced a new policy along with a mobile device application to record any authorised diversion from neighbourhood duties. This allows the force to monitor overall time spent away from neighbourhood policing.
During our inspection, we found that some neighbourhood officers were adapting to the changes. They recognise the changes that the force has made to their role and the requirement to be partnership focused and proactive within their communities.
The force has improved how it listens to the concerns of its communities. It has reintroduced ‘partner and communities together’ meetings and continues with its social media communication and corporate messaging. The force has a new messaging system called Bee in the Loop, which is a two-way digital communication platform that allows the police to listen and respond to community needs and concerns. At the time of our inspection, this system had around 20,000 community members and membership was increasing. The force should review how it works with communities that traditionally interact less often with the police.
Greater Manchester Police is adequate at responding to the public.
The force identified that it needed more staff to answer both emergency and non-emergency calls from the public and meet the national 999 average speed-of-answer target. The force looked for more funding, authorised by the deputy mayor, to invest in the resources needed to answer calls from the public and help its officers to attend incidents quickly.
Its previous recruitment and vetting processes took too long. As a result, many candidates found other jobs between applying for a role as a call handler and receiving a job offer.
The force changed its selection process and began running assessment centres at weekends for candidates. Staff at the centres could make recruitment decisions, so successful candidates received provisional job offers before they left the assessment centre. The force was then able to recruit the extra staff it needed to resource its force contact, crime and operations centre.
The public can contact the force online using live chat or the Single Online Home platform. The force contact, crime and operations workforce monitor the online service that the force provides.
The public can report a crime to the police using the Single Online Home platform, which creates an email and a PDF document. The force has developed a PDF reader that converts the report into an incident log, which negates the need for a police staff member to manually convert it. It also allows them to use THRIVE to risk-assess the report contents and quickly decide if police attendance or the progression of an urgent crime report is needed.
The force evaluated the efficiency of the PDF reader and the time saved in manually inputting the 122,000 Single Online Home reports that it receives each year. It found that it saves 650 hours per month, which is the equivalent of 5 members of staff or £131,000 per year.
The force has also developed an interface called Marple, which is a crime-reporting system. The interface is easier to use and prevents multi-keying of data, which means it is quicker for police staff to record a crime. An evaluation found that it reduces the time taken to record each crime by 25 minutes. From the average number of crimes recorded by the force, this equates to a saving of £2,000 per day or an estimated £365,000 over a six-month period.
Quick attendance at calls for service is important so that officers can safeguard victims and gather evidence.
The force monitors its performance against its graded response policy. For grade 1 emergencies, the target response time is 15 minutes. The force told us that in the year ending 16 July 2023, it achieved this target 85 percent of the time and the average arrival time to a grade 1 emergency was 10 minutes. Grade 2 incidents have a response time target of 1 hour. The force told us that in the year ending 16 July 2023, the average response time was 2 hours but it met its target 52 percent of the time.
In this section we set out our main findings that relate to how well the force responds to the public.
Our previous inspection found that the force was inadequate at responding to the public, and we issued an accelerated cause of concern. The force responded to this with a peer review, a change of leadership within the FCCO centre and a clear plan to address the issues found. It has daily, weekly and monthly management of FCCO centre performance data. Chief officers are actively involved in the change and the Police Uplift Programme to improve how the force responds to the public.
The force uses an innovative approach to recruit new starters for call handling and prioritises vetting to quickly increase the number of staff available to answer calls from the public. The investment in the FCCO centre includes specialist managers and supervisors to support the workforce. The force has also introduced performance and quality assurance processes to confirm the standards of call handling and assessment of risk.
In February 2022, the force introduced a new graded response policy. It has a detailed understanding of the demand it faces, with governance and performance data to support it. This understanding allows it to resource the FCCO centre appropriately.
As a metropolitan force, Greater Manchester Police receives a high number of 999 calls for service. In the year ending 31 March 2023, the force received 201 999 calls per 1,000 population. This was higher than expected compared to other forces in England and Wales. But members of the public should be reassured that if they dial 999 to seek help from Greater Manchester Police, the call will be answered quickly.
In the year ending 31 July 2023, the force answered 85.7 percent of its 999 calls within 10 seconds. This was below the expected standard of 90 percent within 10 seconds. In the same period, the average speed of answer for 999 calls was 4 seconds. In the year ending 16 July 2023, in 0.3 percent of cases, the caller ended a 999 call before it was answered.
In the year ending 16 July 2023, the average speed of answer for 101 calls to the force was 1 minute and 11 seconds. This is better than the force target of three minutes. In the same period, in 9 percent of cases, the caller ended a 101 call before it was answered.
The public can also contact the force via other online methods, such as live chat with a control room operator and via the Single Online Home platform. This means the public can report incidents and crimes that don’t require a more urgent response from the police.
The force has developed a PDF reader that automatically converts an online report into a formatted control log. An operator can then quickly decide whether there is any risk or threat that requires police officer attendance. If there is, they can send the report so that an officer can be dispatched to the incident.
We audited calls into the FCCO centre and the incidents recorded by call handlers. We found that call handlers acted politely, appropriately and ethically and used clear language without bias in all 69 relevant cases we reviewed.
We found that the force identified and recorded vulnerable and repeat victims. This means that call handlers are fully aware of the victim’s circumstances when they respond.
Our victim service assessment found that call handlers used a structured triage approach based on the THRIVE model to assess risk and consider the needs of the victim/caller in 78 of the 80 cases we reviewed. The structured triage record was an accurate and meaningful reflection of the circumstances of the call in 64 of the 79 cases we reviewed. During our inspection, the force was refreshing its THRIVE training for its call-handling staff. It was also upgrading the ICT system to include drop-down prompts to help call handlers record the circumstances and assess the risk. We found that there was effective and appropriate supervision when required in the call-handling department in all eight cases audited.
The force has external experts available within its control room to improve decision-making and risk assessments. Both mental health professionals and the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service have staff co-located within the FCCO centre to provide advice and support when officers are responding to incidents.
Our victim service assessment found that calls were prioritised appropriately in 84 of the 86 cases we reviewed. We also found that of the three applicable cases we reviewed, a supervisor reviewed and approved any downgraded incidents. There was effective and appropriate supervision when required for response/deployment in all 15 cases we reviewed.
Our audit found that on most occasions, the force responded to calls for service appropriately and assessed risk to victims. Response attendance was within the required time (whether downgraded or not) in 30 of the 32 cases we reviewed. The force updated the caller/victim regarding a delay in all three cases we reviewed. We found that attending officers completed appropriate risk assessments for victims and others in all 28 relevant cases.
Call handlers should advise the caller on how to support officers attending the scene by preserving evidence. We found that call handlers gave appropriate advice on preservation of evidence in 27 of the 28 cases we reviewed. Call handlers also gave appropriate advice on crime prevention in 17 of 18 relevant cases.
Greater Manchester Police is adequate at investigating crime.
Although the force has improved its quality of investigations, which has led to an increase in the positive outcomes for victims of crime and in the number of offenders brought to justice, it doesn’t always achieve acceptable outcomes.
The force told us that in the year ending June 2023, it solved 37,327 crimes, which was 8,020 more than the previous year. However, the force remains below the England and Wales average for solved crime but has made progress. Nearly half of its improved overall outcomes are in victim-based crimes, including serious violence, serious sexual offences, burglary and personal robbery offences. During the year ending June 2023, the force increased the number of positive outcomes of victim-based crimes.
The force has improved its consideration of pursuing justice without the victim’s support, through an evidence-led prosecution, where appropriate. Before releasing a suspect, the investigating officer must consult with a supervisor to assess if an evidence-led prosecution is viable. Our victim service assessment identified a small number of such cases. In four of the five cases we reviewed, there was evidence that the force had considered progressing or tried to progress each case without the victim’s support.
However, the force doesn’t always achieve acceptable outcomes for victims of crime, and a low number of crimes are solved following investigations. The force needs to understand the issue and try to achieve better outcomes for victims.
Figure 1: Percentage of victim-based crime recorded by Greater Manchester Police and all forces in England and Wales by selected outcome types in the year ending 31 December 2022
| Outcome types | Greater Manchester rate | England and Wales rate |
| 1: ‘Charged / summonsed’ | 4.6% | 4.6% |
| 2 and 3: ‘Caution – youths’ and ‘Caution – adults’ | 0.4% | 0.7% |
| 8: ‘Community resolutions’ | 0.9% | 1.4% |
| 9: ‘Not in the public interest (Crown Prosecution Service)’ | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| 10 and 21: ‘Prosecution not in the public interest (police decision)’ | 0.8% | 0.8% |
| 14: ‘Evidential difficulties (suspect not identified; victim doesn’t support further action)’ | 11.7% | 5.6% |
| 15: ‘Evidential difficulties (suspect identified; victim supports action)’ | 13.5% | 11.7% |
| 16: ‘Evidential difficulties (suspect identified; victim doesn’t support further action)’ | 22.7% | 21.9% |
| 17: ‘Prosecution time limit expired’ | 0.3% | 0.3% |
| 18: ‘Investigation complete – no suspect identified’ | 39.4% | 40.9% |
| 20: ‘Action taken by another body’ | 0.2% | 1.4% |
| 22: ‘Diversionary, educational or intervention activity’ | 0.2% | 0.4% |
Note: England and Wales excludes City of London data.
In the year ending 31 December 2022, the force recorded 291,408 victim-based crimes. Of these, 6.3 percent received an ‘offences brought to justice’ outcome. This is within the normal range compared to other forces in England and Wales.
Figure 2: Proportion of victim-based crimes assigned outcome 1 (charged/summonsed) by Greater Manchester Police between the year ending 31 March 2015 and the year ending 31 December 2022
In the year ending 31 December 2022, the percentage of victim-based crime assigned outcome 14 (evidential difficulties – suspect not identified; victim doesn’t support further action) increased from 9.3 to 11.7 percent. This is higher than expected compared to other forces across England and Wales.
In the year ending 31 December 2022, the percentage of victim-based crime assigned outcome 15 (evidential difficulties – suspect identified; victim supports action) increased from 12.1 to 13.5 percent. This is higher than expected compared to other forces across England and Wales.
In the year ending 31 December 2021, the percentage of victim-based crime assigned outcome 16 (evidential difficulties – suspect identified; victim doesn’t support further action) decreased from 24.2 to 22.7 percent. This is higher than expected compared to other forces across England and Wales.
In this section we set out our main findings that relate to how well the force investigates crime.
The force has a detailed and clear quality assurance process that has improved how it investigates crime and seeks to improve outcomes for victims. The force has reduced its number of ongoing investigations to a more manageable level, which provides investigators with more time to focus on their investigations.
The force has invested in experienced senior detectives within each of its districts. These detectives review and improve compliance with authorised professional practice (APP) and pursue lines of enquiry. To support district-based detectives, the force has invested in additional coaching and mentoring. It has employed 30 retired experienced detectives to support investigators and those working towards professional detective accreditation.
The force has introduced a more efficient way of recording an investigation’s overview, enquiry updates, current position and supervisor oversight. This has led to effective finalisation of investigations. The introduction of the ‘action review document’ has improved the way lines of enquiry and supervisory oversight are recorded. It has also made the quality assurance of investigations more efficient.
During our inspection, we audited a number of investigations. We found that the force had improved the quality of investigations in several areas compared to our last inspection and audit. The quality and speed of investigations had improved with 93 of the 100 relevant investigations we reviewed judged to be effective. We found that the force had effective supervisory oversight of investigations in 78 of the 83 cases reviewed. There was evidence of an appropriate investigation plan in line with APP guidance in 70 of the 72 cases reviewed. We found that investigation plans were followed and updated in 68 of the 70 cases reviewed. Identified suspects were arrested/interviewed where appropriate in 26 of 30 cases. An arrest was made in an appropriate period, at the earliest opportunity, in all 26 cases reviewed.
The force has improved its quality of service and provides regular updates to victims of crime. Victims are more likely to have confidence in a police investigation when the force keeps them informed and meets their needs.
In our victim service assessment, we found that victims received regular updates from investigating officers in 85 of the 88 cases we reviewed. Officers referred victims to partner agencies for victim support in 36 of the 37 cases we reviewed.
The Code of Practice for Victims of Crime requires forces to carry out a needs assessment at an early stage to determine whether a victim needs additional support. The force carried out this assessment in all investigations and recorded the request for additional support in all relevant investigations. We found that officers took victim personal statements in all seven cases we reviewed. This gives victims the opportunity to describe how the crime has affected their lives.
We found that crime finalisation had effective and appropriate supervision in 87 of the 93 relevant cases we reviewed. The victim was consulted prior to the outcome being given in all 50 cases reviewed. The victim’s views were considered in all 59 cases reviewed. We found that the force informed the victim of the outcome in 79 of 80 relevant cases. A clear reason for the outcome was recorded in 83 of the 87 cases reviewed. We found that the correct outcome was nearly always applied to investigations; we found this in 83 of the 91 relevant cases we reviewed.
Our victim service assessment also found that in 83 of the 88 relevant cases we reviewed, the force was judged to provide a good level of victim service, in line with the Code of Practice for Victims of Crime.
Greater Manchester Police is adequate at protecting vulnerable people.
The force’s armed response vehicles have technology that notifies the vehicle’s crew when it is near an address at which a Domestic Violence Protection Order (DVPO) is in force. This allows officers to visit the address to monitor and enforce the DVPO if required. The force told us that since May 2023, there have been 422 DVPO alert notifications, which has resulted in police officers visiting 165 addresses with DVPOs in force. This has resulted in the arrest of six individuals for breaching DVPO conditions. The force is now seeking to use the same technology within its roads policing vehicles.
It is important for officers attending the scene of a domestic abuse-related incident to assess the potential risk of serious harm to the victim. To do this, they complete a risk assessment questionnaire and research previous history. Risk levels are graded as high, medium or standard.
The force has dedicated officers working with partner organisations to review incidents and refer victims to external support services. For example, an independent domestic abuse adviser can support and help victims of domestic abuse.
The force has a process for domestic abuse-related incidents that are assessed as standard risk, which means that current evidence doesn’t suggest serious harm is likely. The process includes training for police officers to complete the risk assessment referral at a scene of domestic abuse. The officer must also speak to a sergeant while at the scene.
Once submitted, the standard risk assessment form is checked for any information and disclosure under Operation Encompass. This notifies schools if there has been a domestic incident at a pupil’s address. On occasion, we found that multi-agency safeguarding hub (MASH) secondary risk assessors within some districts would review the standard risk referral if they had the capacity. However, in some of the busier policing districts, MASH staff didn’t have the capacity.
Officers’ assessment of risk is important. Correct assessment means victims at higher risk receive the safeguarding support they need to reduce the risk of potential harm. The force may wish to introduce a quality assurance process in relation to standard risk referrals to check that its officers have set the appropriate level of risk.
It is good practice to provide staff working within a multi-agency safeguarding hub (MASH), who review both domestic abuse and child protection referrals, with specialist training. This makes sure that they appropriately assess the level of risk and that victims are referred to agencies that can support and safeguard vulnerable people. For example, they should be aware of the effect that coercive, controlling behaviour may have on the assessed level of risk.
During our inspection, we found some very experienced and appropriately trained staff within a few of the force’s district MASHs. However, this was inconsistent. We also found some staff who hadn’t received appropriate training. The force should make sure that all MASH staff who complete secondary risk assessment referrals receive the appropriate training for their roles.
In this section we set out our main findings that relate to how well the force protects vulnerable people.
The force response to protecting vulnerable people is led by a chief officer who is supported by a dedicated team – the public protection governance unit. This team reviews the quality of the service the force provides to vulnerable victims. The force has a senior detective lead for each area of vulnerability identified by the College of Policing.
The force has structured and effective working relationships with its local authority partner organisations. It uses both police and partner organisation data to review its demand and how it manages vulnerability across Greater Manchester.
The force has a governance and performance meeting structure within local authority districts and across Greater Manchester policing districts at a strategic level, such as with Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA). The public protection governance unit reviews the quality of provision across all districts. It has a senior detective lead to standardise and improve the service to vulnerable victims. The force receives feedback from governance and performance meetings, GMCA victim surveys and dedicated victim services co-ordinators so it can improve its service to protect vulnerable people.
The force has increased its use of preventative orders such as DVPNs and DVPOs. It has consistently focused on domestic abuse through its governance and performance meetings. Officers are asked to take positive action at domestic abuse incidents. This has led to a significant increase in DVPO applications. In the year ending 30 September 2021, the force applied for 577 DVPOs, which was 2 applications per 10,000 population. In the year ending 30 September 2022, the number of DVPO applications almost doubled to 1,091, which is 3.8 applications per 10,000 population.
The focus on reducing domestic abuse includes monitoring DVPOs. We found that neighbourhood officer duties included monitoring DVPOs within their neighbourhood areas. The force’s armed response vehicles are also equipped to activate when they are near an address at which a DVPO is in force. This allows officers to visit the address to monitor and enforce the DVPO if required.
The force monitors the use of the Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme (also known as Clare’s Law). Local policing district MASH teams keep a vulnerability tracker for the use of preventative orders. They monitor the ‘right to ask’ and ‘right to know’ elements of the scheme. During our inspection, we found that the force usually complied with the 28-day national time frame for disclosure.
The force has 12 MASHs, 1 within each of its policing districts. Each MASH triages the referrals it receives from officers attending incidents and from its partner organisations. They also risk-assess child protection referrals and high and medium-risk domestic abuse cases. They refer victims to specialist services within each local authority area who can support them.
Each MASH is able to review child protection and high-risk domestic abuse referrals within 24 hours. They also review medium-risk cases in a timely manner. Some areas have a higher demand, which requires additional resources and careful monitoring at times. Each district holds a daily risk management meeting for high-risk cases referred since the previous day. The meetings are attended by police and partner organisations. They share information in relation to incidents and victims and seek ways to keep the victims safe.
The force has effective multi-agency risk assessment conference (MARAC) provisions with partner organisations to provide support and safeguarding to high-risk domestic abuse victims. In the year ending 31 March 2023, over 11,000 cases of domestic abuse were assessed as high-risk and referred to MARAC. The assessment of risk is quality assured through the MASH to make sure that the force has maintained its commitment for all high-risk cases to be referred to MARAC for safeguarding. The district MARAC meets frequently to make sure that it meets this high level of demand across Greater Manchester.
Greater Manchester Police requires improvement at managing offenders and suspects.
Upon initial inspection in April 2023, the force told us that it had backlogs of 1,490 registered sex offender visits and 1,535 active risk management system risk assessments. Home visits and risk assessments are carried out to accurately assess the risks posed by registered sex offenders to reduce those risks and safeguard the public.
The force responded very quickly to the feedback we provided at the time of our initial inspection. It improved its registered sex offender management plan and changed how its team operates. The new plan predicted that the backlog would be resolved by the end of the year. The force monitored the reductions in backlogs weekly, which showed that it was completing more visits than expected and clearing backlogs more quickly than predicted.
At the end of our inspection period, the force told us that backlogs had been reduced to 163 overdue registered sex offender visits. As a result, it is considering keeping the structure it developed as part of its successful plan to reduce overdue visits.
However, our inspection also found that the force routinely planned 12-month revisit reminders and relied on offender managers to record any earlier visits if required by the registered sex offenders’ level of risk category. We found that offender managers weren’t consistently recording earlier dates. We also found examples when earlier dates weren’t recorded and as a result, the offender manager had missed visiting a high-risk offender within the appropriate time.
Towards the end of our inspection, we found that due to the management of the visit diary, some visits to registered sex offenders who had been part of the overdue backlog had again lapsed and become overdue. The force should review how it monitors and manages registered sex offender visits to make sure it can meet the visit requirements for each level of risk.
During our inspection, we reviewed offender management records. We found that the force needed to provide clearer guidance to staff on the benefits of regularly checking the Police National Database. This will help them to understand all intelligence and risks and effectively update risk management plans.
The force carries out safeguarding and intelligence checks before a search warrant application and enforcement action is taken against those suspected of sharing images of child sexual abuse. Usually, the social services team check whether any children are linked to an address that has been identified as being involved in the indecent sharing of child abuse images.
If a child is linked to both this address and an open case with children’s services, then the investigating officer makes a referral. They will then attend a strategy meeting prior to any enforcement action. However, if a child linked to the address isn’t an open case with children’s services, the force will submit a referral after it has taken enforcement action. This means that the force isn’t quickly providing social services team with all the information it needs to determine if there is an increased risk to a child.
The force should make sure that child safeguarding referrals are timely to manage the risk posed by suspected online child abuse offenders.
We found that the management of medium and low-risk online child abuse referrals was inconsistent. Investigations assessed as medium or lower risk are allocated to district detectives for enforcement action. Once allocated, the process to track progress and enforcement action within the Kent internet risk assessment tool time frame guidance is unclear. We found that some referrals weren’t being enforced within the required time frame. This means that the force needs to carry out further intelligence assessments and checks to reassess levels of risk. Without improving the monitoring and timeliness of enforcement action, the force can’t be sure it is managing the risks posed by online child abuse suspects.
In this section we set out our main findings that relate to how well the force manages offenders and suspects.
The force is good at pursuing and arresting offenders. The force told us that in the year ending 31 March 2023, it arrested 43 percent more offenders than in the year ending 31 March 2022. It has reduced its over-reliance on voluntary attendance for suspects. It has also increased its custody facilities and staff to support the increase in arrests. The force’s governance and performance arrangements review the management of suspects and offenders. This makes sure that district policing leaders are held to account for managing and apprehending suspects and wanted people.
The force has daily processes in place to task officers with arresting offenders who pose the greatest risk to vulnerable victims, such as high-risk domestic abuse offenders. Most districts have the resources for such priority arrests. For example, the force has a higher domestic abuse arrest rate as a percentage of all domestic abuse-related crimes than the England and Wales average.
The force manages the use of pre-charge bail well. In line with the reforms to the Bail Act 1976 introduced in October 2022, the force has increased the use of pre-charge bail. This helps to safeguard victims and witnesses.
The force has introduced bail managers within custody suites to support officers in managing pre-charge bail. Bail managers make sure that offenders comply with any conditions and that they return when they are due to answer bail. The force has reduced its use of released under investigation. The force has effective processes in place to monitor and manage the use of both pre-charge bail and released under investigation powers. It is developing an IT application to help officers manage offenders they have released on pre-charge bail. We found that the force examined data at both district and force performance meetings to support the effective use and management of bail.
In the year ending 31 March 2022, there were 1.4 registered sex offenders per 1,000 population in the Greater Manchester area. A dedicated team manages the volume of registered sex offenders in the force area. The force has also increased the number of trained offender managers and supervisors to reduce the ratio of offender managers to registered sex offenders. As a result, it has reduced the number of registered sex offenders per offender manager from 85 to a more manageable 47. This allows the force to better manage the risks posed to the public by the most dangerous offenders.
The force’s approach to managing offenders hasn’t always been compliant with national APP. During our inspection, we were pleased to find that the force had reversed previous leadership decisions, so processes are now in line with the APP for managing registered sex offenders.
The force has good working arrangements with the probation service. There is good communication between the two organisations. The sex offender management unit carries out joint visits with the probation service in line with national multi-agency public protection arrangements.
The force’s dedicated team that investigates online child abuse referrals completes applications for sexual harm prevention orders. These provide the force with a consistent approach to the ongoing management of offenders once they are on the sex offenders register.
The sex offender management team also works well with the force’s legal team and will vary or seek new orders to manage the risks posed by offenders. The force provides training for other departments to enhance staff’s knowledge and skills to identify when an ancillary civil order may keep the public safe. For example, district detectives will contact the team to discuss the most appropriate conditions to include in the order application.
To help monitor offenders, the force uses digital monitoring software to identify sex offenders’ online activity. The force has increased its number of software licences to improve its chances of detecting any breaches of orders or identifying further offending.
The force has an online child abuse investigation team (OCAIT) that has trained officers who investigate the online referrals it receives. The team has grown and will reach its allocated number of personnel once its new team members are in place.
The OCAIT team investigates high and very high-risk referrals. It then plans enforcement action and obtains search warrants. We found that the OCAIT team worked within the Kent internet risk assessment tool time frame and that it didn’t have any backlogs. The relevant police district receives medium and low-risk referrals for investigation.
The force supports the welfare of identified suspects arrested by the OCAIT team. For example, officers designate a welfare officer during any enforcement action. It is their responsibility to liaise with the suspect and their family and to make sure that arrangements, such as signposting to support agencies and the completion of a suspect risk assessment, are made.
To support the OCAIT team, the force has increased its ability to examine suspects’ electronic devices while carrying out enforcement action or home visits. The force’s specialist digital investigation unit is also available to attend addresses. This helps offender managers to examine devices during visits or when executing a search warrant at a suspect’s address. This ability to identify devices that may contain evidence of offending improves the force’s ability to identify those who have committed online offending and pose a danger to the public.
Greater Manchester Police is adequate at building and developing its workforce.
The force recognised that work-related stress was affecting workforce well-being. As a result, it provided 1,000 of its first-line managers with REACTMH – active listening skills training for supervisors.
The training teaches supervisors to monitor their team members’ mental well‑being. They can then have supportive conversations with colleagues about their mental health, especially those who often experience potentially traumatic events.
In 2021, the force reviewed its overall workforce turnover, including officers who were in the process of transferring to other police forces. The force expected student officer resignations to increase as it moved to its new route of entry into the police. It recruited significant numbers to achieve the uplift targets it had been set. However, the force noticed that more officers were leaving compared to the national rate.
To help address this, in September 2022, the force introduced its stay team. Its goal is to keep experienced workforce members and support student officers within the force. The stay team meets staff and officers to identify any issues and barriers to remaining with the force. It also works with managers to find other ways to encourage workforce members to stay. This can include workload support, training or a shift change.
The force told us that between September 2022 and March 2023, the stay team successfully retained 70 police officers who were actively leaving the force and retained a further 38 who were considering leaving. As a result, the force turnover rate has reduced to below the national average.
The stay team has allowed the force to identify the reasons why its officers may seek to leave. It has analysed these reasons for various cohorts of its workforce, including under-represented groups. These include issues relating to workloads or dissatisfaction with elements of the job. This has helped the force to understand and try to reduce those reasons.
The force has evaluated the effectiveness of its stay team. It told us that between September 2022 and June 2023, there were 339 requests for interviews with the stay team, of which 70 percent were self-referrals. Of those interviewed, 71 percent remained with the force. This means that the force has retained a total of 1,305 years of experience and achieved a saving of £31.8m on those members of the workforce who were actively leaving or considering leaving.
Personal development reviews (PDRs) should be an effective tool for officers and staff to record their objectives and achievements. PDRs are essential for supervisors to understand the development needs of their workforce. The force has a process for completing PDRs and a PDR requirement for its police officers. However, PDRs have only recently been mandated for police staff. The force told us that 71 percent of officers comply.
The officers and staff we spoke to had mixed views on the value of the process. In contrast, more officers and staff said that they found regular one-to-one meetings with their line managers to be more useful for reviewing their workloads, performance and well-being.
Members of the workforce should have formal PDRs with their line managers, which should include a plan and then a review of their professional development over a 12-month period. These should be seen as effective and valued by the workforce.
Policing relies on the consent of the public to operate effectively. To achieve this, it is essential that the police are representative of the communities they serve. While improvements have been made nationally, some roles and ranks still lack the diversity needed to accurately represent communities. It is important that forces identify and address barriers faced by people from under-represented groups.
The force has invested in an equality, diversity and inclusion board. The board plans to gather and monitor data on its student cohort of officers and hold listening groups with under-represented groups within its workforce. It aims to better understand the challenges and barriers these groups face in order to support their workplace development.
There is a good range of staff networks but those involved told us that better communication with senior leaders could help the force support people from under-represented groups.
We found that while the force had some plans to identify barriers and support the development of under-represented groups, they were incomplete. The force doesn’t have a formal action plan with a range of options available to those who experience barriers to career progression.
The force needs to formally develop its approach to supporting people from under-represented groups if it is to attract and retain talented officers and staff.
In this section we set out our main findings that relate to how well the force builds and develops its workforce.
The force has a good understanding of the well-being needs of its workforce. It has a good governance structure in place, which is led by a chief officer, and has recently refreshed its well-being strategy and delivery plan. The force uses a comprehensive range of methods to monitor and assess workforce well-being. They include chief officer roadshows, gathering feedback from well-being district single points of contact and reviewing occupational health unit (OHU) data from external well-being services and information from HR business partners in each district.
We found that the force had taken steps to address the well-being challenges its officers face. The force uses the Blue Light Wellbeing Framework and absence management data to identify and address the key areas that relate to well-being. We found that workloads were generally manageable for the force’s operational officers. The force has also invested in resources, fleet, equipment and police uniform to support its police officers in their roles.
The force has listed high-risk roles that receive additional monitoring for trauma. To improve on this, the health and safety team is now assessing each role within the force to identify physical and mental health risks. It then decides what arrangements need to be made to reduce the risk. This includes mandatory screening for those identified as being at high risk of exposure to trauma.
At the time of our inspection, we noted that officers and staff working within roles that have a higher risk of exposure to potentially traumatic incidents are offered psychological screening. However, the force is aware that they don’t always accept the offer of psychological support. The force is working on IT software to monitor the support its officers and staff receive.
The force has enhanced the support to higher-risk roles by training 12 officers in trauma impact prevention techniques. The aim is to help officers and staff to manage their own reflective processes in a structured way. The techniques were designed for the police service due to the high levels of trauma that officers may be exposed to. The trained officers can then train members of the workforce who are likely to encounter trauma and help them build resilience.
The force has also purchased 250 days at police benevolent fund premises. These will allow its workforce members who are in high-risk roles to take breaks and have time to decompress from the workplace.
The force has a range of prevention initiatives and training to help its workforce and supervisors support the well-being of officers and staff. For example, the force has increased its number of trauma risk management trained managers and staff to support officers after they have been exposed to traumatic incidents.
The force has completed the Blue Light Wellbeing Framework self-assessment of its OHU and done a peer review. This identified 28 recommendations to meet the framework’s occupational health foundation standard. A project was set up and prioritised, and updates are uploaded to the Blue Light Wellbeing Framework service regularly.
Following a review of its services, the force has extensively remodelled the OHU. It now meets its purpose and provides privacy for those attending the unit.
The force has also made sure that all OHU staff are qualified for their roles. It found that nurses were able to resolve OHU issues approximately three times more quickly than doctors. The force has, therefore, moved away from a doctor-led to a nurse-led service. This has reduced waiting times by half from 42 days to 21 days.
The force has recruited over 1,100 new police officers as part of its uplift target. The force went over its target to make sure it was met and that the force wasn’t financially penalised for not doing so. The force recruited a considerable number of officers on each intake. And like other forces, it continued recruiting and training its student officers during the pandemic despite the contact restrictions. However, this means that some students haven’t had face-to-face training or scenario-based practical sessions. This may have negatively affected their confidence and preparedness for operational policing.
The force has enhanced its tutor resources to support the volume of new student officers. Most officers told us that they feel supported by the force and their tutors. However, they struggle to complete the academic work and assignments set while working within a busy metropolitan force. Tutors told us that at times they struggle to provide dedicated support to student officers because there are so many new starters.
The force has trialled some additional support and coaching for its students. For example, one district has developed a training academy to support its new students. Students complete a 15-week structured short-term programme where they are attached to the district’s various operational teams. This provides students with a greater knowledge and understanding of operational policing.
Student officers told us that they value the additional support provided by the academy. Students from other districts don’t have the same additional support or experience. The force may wish to make sure that its student officers receive a consistent level of support across its policing districts.
The force has a good understanding of its leadership capability and capacity. It has a structured approach to providing support and training to first-line managers and other leaders at different ranks. The force has the training in place to support new first-line managers and provide development opportunities for existing first-line managers. The force monitors course attendance and evaluates the training it provides.
The chief constable holds meetings with all first and second-line managers in the force. He provides clear instruction on their roles, his expectations, the standards they need to maintain and the support they can expect from him and all senior officers. At the conclusion of the meeting, the chief constable and the manager formally sign a ‘leaders’ pledge’ to provide that standard of leadership and service to the community and their team.
The force has technical skills training courses for its first-line leaders and those who are in temporary and acting roles as first-line leaders. The force also provides continuing professional development masterclasses for its leaders to maintain and develop their skills and ongoing training.
The force understands its leadership requirements and takes account of its predicted retirements, career progression and those going through the promotion process. The force has planned selection processes to make sure it can meet its leadership needs.
Greater Manchester Police’s leadership and management is good.
In this section we set out our main findings that relate to leadership and management.
The force has effective governance and performance management processes that reflect its communities’ needs and local and national priorities. It uses analysis and data to make sure it is effective and efficient. The force’s performance objectives align with its strategy. Force management statements and performance objectives are supported by the force’s plans to achieve its goals.
The force’s strategic planning process is quite effective and is strongly driven by the force’s ‘plan on a page’ (POAP). This is in its force management statement and has clear links to the mayor’s Police and Crime Plan – Standing Together 2022–2025. There is a reasonable understanding of current local and national demands and how effectively they are met.
Strategic decision-making is based on effective analysis of intelligence and trustworthy data. The force uses analysis and data to make sure it operates effectively and efficiently. It has a strong reporting governance structure in place with a POAP programme board that reports its decisions for effective working. Working groups meet regularly to make sure force development projects, programmes of work and performance meet the POAP priorities. The policing districts have meetings to improve daily performance. These meetings review operational and HR data to address force priorities and improve public services to local communities. The force, therefore, understands current performance and is steadily improving it.
The chief officers and district commanders talk with the communities they serve. The force interacts with its communities regularly to understand local priorities. This informs future changes to its operating model and associated workforce recruitment, development and training.
The force has assessed the capacity and capability of leadership at all levels. It has plans in place to address gaps in leadership. The force understands how senior and general leadership is perceived and understood throughout the workforce at all levels. It is taking action to improve standards of leadership. Leaders throughout the force have a clear understanding of what is expected of them through the POAP and are able to respond.
The chief constable and chief officers hold large events across the force to reinforce organisational priorities, performance, values and expectations to officers and staff, which are supported by the leaders’ pledge.
The force has a detailed workforce plan that aligns roles with capability. It has identified its current challenges and has plans to tackle them. For example, resources and investment are aligned with the force’s priority areas, such as enhancing the call management centre, crime recording and crime investigation.
The force is improving how it meets and manages demand and is aware of the areas that require more work. A force priority is to improve the services provided by its enabling departments, such as IT and digital, HR, fleet services and forensic services, and their response to meeting future needs/demands for operational policing.
The force has appointed two new assistant chief officers. One is responsible for IT and digital and the other is responsible for HR. Together with the chief finance officer, they are the strategic leads for the enabling services and are responsible for improving service provision. They make sure that operational and enabling areas are linked in order to meet force priorities in line with the mayor’s plans.
The force’s operating model and workforce help it to respond to priorities and current and future demand. There are effective systems in place that make sure crimes are allocated to appropriately skilled staff and units.
The force uses environmental scanning to anticipate future demand and plan for events and seasonal demand. As a result, it has made significant investment in the specialist operations department to improve its function and support to the force.
The force knows that its response to urgent and standard calls from the public requires more work. To achieve this, it is reducing the time that response officers spend on crime investigations and dealing with non-policing matters, such as mental health care issues.
Crime investigation is centralised either at force or district level and allocated to appropriately skilled staff. This should allow response officers to carry only minimal workloads so that they can respond effectively to the community and be proactive in their approach.
The district prevention hubs work in partnership with local community safety organisations. They have reduced, crime, antisocial behaviour and vulnerability in high-demand areas.
In the context of a national detective shortage, the force is working hard to recruit, develop and train detectives, which includes direct entry recruitment to detective roles. New detectives and those working towards accreditation require support and mentoring when investigating serious and complex crime. In the meantime, the force employs agency staff with investigation skills to support its investigation teams. It currently invests £1.8m in 240 agency staff to support its investigative workforce.
The force is productive with its resources and assets. It continues to improve productivity through digital, data and technology solutions. This includes mobile working and individual laptops equipped with a force application to make it quicker and easier to record crimes. Automated fingerprint readers and the digital evidence platform allow officers to gather and upload CCTV evidence more easily.
The force has a good understanding of value for money and the productivity of its resources and assets. For example, the specialist operations division works closely with Transport for Greater Manchester using a problem-solving approach to tackle crime and e-bike theft.
The force has worked with the London School of Economics and looked at the benefits of flexible homeworking in relation to its call management and crime recording division. It now has a better understanding of homeworking productivity and plans to extend this research to identify further savings.
The force has a strong governance structure around its collaborative working. It has appointed an assistant chief constable to chair a force collaboration board. Board members have extensively reviewed all existing force collaborations and signed agreements regarding productivity, risk, value and implementation of the stated objectives for the community. This has allowed the board to track the ongoing benefits of these services. For example, a review of the regional underwater search unit, to which the force contributes, has produced better data that helps it understand if the force is getting value for money.
The force has enough resources to make sure it can follow its priorities. Its financial plans are affordable and sustainable. They will support the force to continue to meet future demand.
The force can show that it is looking for ways to reduce costs, attract additional external funding and increase value for money from collaboration to allow it to invest more of its resources in priority areas. Being part of the GMCA family and having the mayor’s support have been very helpful. This provides opportunities to work with partners and improve efficiencies. For example, the force works with Trafford Council and collaborates with Greater Manchester Shared Services, which offers a professional payroll and pension service. There is potential to share estate with the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service and other partners within the
GMCA family.
There is a clear agreement between the force’s organisational plans and its medium-term financial plan, which is current until 2025/26. At the time of our inspection, it was being updated with changes in force priorities, such as custody provision, revenue and capital review. The force anticipates that the POAP change programme board will improve efficiencies and create savings by, for example, moving to a cloud-based system.
The force’s strategy for future use of reserves is both prudent and sound. The force has agreed a sustainable plan with the mayor. This will maintain adequate funds and use other funds to support and invest in priority demand areas.
GMCA own the force’s reserves, which amount to £44m. This is allocated to the force with the expectation that it spends £13m on insurance/liability. Around half of the funds are spent on supporting change and investment to support change programmes that aim to improve quality of service and force efficiency. The force has a £2m operational contingency fund available, which it didn’t draw on in the previous year. There is £16m in reserves for general policing, which is 2.5 percent of net revenue expenditure. The force told us that a little more could be placed in its reserves.
With the appointment of a new chief finance officer, the force has a strong governance structure to achieve a balanced budget and strong financial plans. It is continuing to try and understand previous budgetary and spending commitments and is reviewing all contracts to identify financial savings. For example, the new assistant chief officer for IT and digital is reviewing all contracts and considering bringing some IT services back in-house. This work has already achieved savings, and it is thought that more could be made.
Budgetary data is improving and is now available to chief officers and district commanders. The force doesn’t have an income generation strategy. Some income is made by providing overspill custody facilities to surrounding forces. There are plans to generate more income, such as from the sale of seized vehicles. However, the force needs infrastructure in place for this to be successful.
Data in this report is from a range of sources, including:
When we collected data directly from police forces, we took reasonable steps to agree the design of the data collection with forces and with other interested parties such as the Home Office. We gave forces several opportunities to quality assure and validate the data they gave us, to make sure it was accurate. We shared the submitted data with forces, so they could review their own and other forces’ data. This allowed them to analyse where data was notably different from other forces or internally inconsistent.
We set out the source of this report’s data below.
British Transport Police was outside the scope of inspection. Any aggregated totals for England and Wales exclude British Transport Police data, so will differ from those published by the Home Office.
When other forces were unable to supply data, we mention this under the relevant sections below.
For all uses of population as a denominator in our calculations, unless otherwise noted, we use ONS mid-2020 population estimates.
We surveyed the police workforce across England and Wales, to understand their views on workloads, redeployment and how suitable their assigned tasks were. This survey was a non-statistical, voluntary sample so the results may not be representative of the workforce population. The number of responses per force varied. So we treated results with caution and didn’t use them to assess individual force performance. Instead, we identified themes that we could explore further during fieldwork.
Our victim service assessments (VSAs) will track a victim’s journey from reporting a crime to the police, through to outcome stage. All forces will be subjected to a VSA within our PEEL inspection programme. Some forces will be selected to additionally be tested on crime recording, in a way that ensures every force is assessed on its crime recording practices at least every three years.
Details of the technical methodology for the Victim Service Assessment.
Data on 999 calls is provided by BT. Call answering time is the time taken for a call to be transferred from BT to a force, and the time taken by that force to answer the call. This data is provided for all 43 police forces in England and Wales and covers the year ending 31 March 2023
We took data on crime and outcomes from the April 2023 release of the Home Office police-recorded crime and outcomes data tables. Crime severity scores were taken from the July 2020 release of the Office for National Statistics experimental statistics.
Total police-recorded crime includes all crime (except fraud) recorded by all forces in England and Wales (except BTP). Home Office publications on the overall volumes and rates of recorded crime and outcomes include British Transport Police, which is outside the scope of this HMICFRS inspection. Therefore, England and Wales rates in this report will differ from those published by the Home Office.
Police-recorded crime data should be treated with care. Recent increases may be due to forces’ renewed focus on accurate crime recording since our 2014 national crime data inspection.
For a full commentary and explanation of crime and outcome types please see the Home Office statistics.
We collected this data directly from all 43 police forces in England and Wales. This data is as provided by forces in April 2022 and covers the year ending 31 March 2022.
Greater Manchester PEEL assessment 2023–2025
You can find more about Greater Manchester Police on our dedicated force page.
Greater Manchester has ten local authorities, each with a unique identity and policing challenges. The force provides policing for a diverse population of 2.8m residents, of which over 100,000 are students, and 23% are from a non-white background.
The region has a rapidly growing economy, however 585,000 people are living in neighbourhoods that are amongst the most deprived in the country, and at least 40% of incidents attended by Greater Manchester Police require other partners to help resolve.
Greater Manchester Police has made significant improvements, but further changes needed
Find out more about HMICFRS’s work and other inspection areas.
Find out how well other forces have performed during their PEEL assessment.
You can view the recommendations for all forces made by HMICFRS on our Progress against recommendations page. This shows how much progress has been made on these recommendations.
