PCC Response - The policing response to antisocial behaviour - PEEL spotlight report
18th November 2024
Dear Home Secretary
I have received and read the PEEL spotlight report relating to the policing response to antisocial behaviour, published on the 10 October 2024 – The policing response to antisocial behaviour - PEEL spotlight report.
As promised in my police and crime plan, I intend to reinvigorate local policing to improve the effectiveness of Bedfordshire Police’s response to antisocial behaviour. This will involve ensuring an equitable allocation of resources across every part of the county, proportionate to the severity of the criminality faced. I am committed to looking at best practice elsewhere and bringing this into Bedfordshire.
To drive this forward, I have created a mission board that I will chair to closely advise and scrutinise on progress in this area of priority. The mission board includes members from local authorities, local BIDs and academic advisors and will work to drive the implementation of the specific recommendations within the report as well as the key objectives within the police and crime plan.
On the operational recommendations within the report, I have requested comment from the Chief Constable. The specifics of these comments are outlined below.
Recommendation 1: As part of the Force annual Audit Plan, 40 ASB Personal incidents are audited each month which predominantly is looking at the National Crime Recording Standard (NCRS) point of view to identify any missed crimes. This audit also reviews the National Standard for incident recording (NSIR) closing codes used. This was an issue raised by HMIC previously, as part of the Crime Data Integrity Programme (CDI) and in the recent report about correct identification at outset and when incidents are closed. This is reported on monthly within the NCRS Report. If a subsequent crime is recorded the incident should be closed as the crime closing code not as ASB. All Home Office Crime Recording (HOCR) / NCRS training inputs have been delivered by the Crime Registrar team and includes reference to ensuring if officers / staff deal with ASB incidents they should be mindful of associated crimes, particularly conduct crimes.
From April 2023 Bedfordshire Police started a trial area in Central Bedfordshire seeing the demise of the CoTTs system and recording everything onto the Force command and Control system creating two separate summaries for ASB (Just Reported) and WIP (Work in progress). This for the first time made ASB visible and accountable across force systems. Further discussions and tweaks saw all 3 areas across Bedfordshire using this process with the last being Luton in January 2024. The internal process is now business as usual. The above process is dip sampled regularly by the crime registrar and audit team and has seen increased compliance.
Recommendation 2: Bedfordshire Police are training their community sergeants, enhancing their ability to both allocate resource on Storm and close ASB incidents. By doing this it will further highlight the work that the teams do in this area and feed into wider performance data around allocation to ASB incidents. It has been agreed that this training will also include an update from Crime Register team with any relevant changes. As future proofing is key, the Force Control Room training team are setting two courses a year to pick up any new joiners or those requiring additional support.
Recommendation 3: Bedfordshire Police apply a THRIVE assessment to all reported cases of ASB to enable an initial risk assessment and define police action. Bedfordshire Police have a process of re-thriving based on changes to information and intelligence and this is completed on the Storm incident management log and on Athena if a problem-solving plan is created. These systems comply with police retention requirements.
Recommendation 4: Bedfordshire Police PSPs are structured in accordance with the SARA problem solving model and this is supervised and monitored through our Community Policing specific performance management framework. Bedfordshire Police will carry out a qualitative review against this recommendation and provide a concluding outcome. This is an area where Bedfordshire Police have still got room for improvement. PSPs are created around all identified public priorities as well as core nominals and locations and work is being completed in this space.
Recommendation 8: Bedfordshire Police community officers receive ASB training and refresher training and this forms part of our Endorsed Learning Programme for Community Policing. However, Bedfordshire Police shall review the contents against the CoP guidelines and resources and will provide a concluding outcome to this recommendation.
I will be closely monitoring any developments through performance and governance meetings with the Chief Constable to hold Bedfordshire Police to account. I have requested a spotlight report on local policing to be presented at next month's meeting which will provide me with data and analysis of the current response to antisocial behaviour. Something I am particularly interested in in terms of this is the way in which this response is communicated to the public.
Yours Sincerely
John Tizard
Police and Crime Commissioner