The Scottish Government

« Previous | Contents | Next »

Listen

4. AREAS TO BE REVIEWED FOLLOWING THE 2003 PRIMARY INSPECTION

Area for Review 1 - The impact of 'Operation Capital' on service delivery within the City of Edinburgh

4.1 Since it was established under the force's Operation Capital on 1 April 2003, the new 'A' Division has come in for a great deal of criticism. At our 2004 review inspection we noted the force's awareness of early problems and the measures it was taking to resolve these.

4.2 During this inspection HMIC learned that a full Best Value review of the division had been carried out and had resulted in 58 recommendations. Work to address these recommendations was closely scrutinised and proactively managed. The last formal update report on this review, in October 2005, showed what progress had been made.

Table 2: Implementation of Best Value Review Recommendations

4.3 We were particularly pleased to note the division's strong emphasis on local policing, with the areas commanded by chief inspectors forming the basis for delivering services. In addition it was noted that the role of the Criminal Investigation department had been rationalised, as a result of which it now has direct links with local policing.

4.4 HMIC commends the force's approach to the forthcoming boundary changes, which has resulted in Operation Align. In 'A' Division the new divisional commander is using Operation Align to drive significant change. While the division has undoubtedly experienced considerable change since its inception, we understand that it sees the boundary changes as an opportunity to greatly improve its services to communities.

4.5 The changes will include the following:

• six chief inspectors commanding local policing areas aligned to the council's six community planning areas;
• a superintendent responsible for two local policing areas;
• an inspector responsible for each of the 12 neighbourhood partnership areas;
• each superintendent's area will have five inspectors responsible for the community patrol officer teams carrying out 24-hour response policing;
• each superintendent will have a team of criminal investigation officers, led by a detective chief inspector, under his or her direct command; and
• the partnership superintendent will become the superintendent (support), responsible for divisional support functions including enquiry officers.

4.6 The divisional commander and his management team are enthusiastic about the force's Performance and Activity Management ( PAM) framework, and see real benefits flowing from it. More than simply a force executive tool for holding the division to account, in their view the framework provides a structured opportunity to discuss issues and resources in context. The division is currently developing a local version of PAM that will link in directly with the division's tactical PAM meetings. The divisional commander is also keen to ensure that the National Intelligence Model ( NIM) becomes fully embedded in informing how services should be delivered. As a result of considerable investment, a well-resourced divisional intelligence unit is now in place and available on a 24-hour, daily basis. A divisional intelligence support unit has also been established to provide immediate support in monitoring ongoing incidents, developing intelligence, identifying officer safety issues and publishing real-time briefings. The unit will also act as a repository and single point of contact for information on all operations, problem-solving partnerships and initiatives.

4.7 Nevertheless, discussions with operational officers during the inspection suggest that the division has yet to fully embrace NIM. Officers would welcome greater access to intelligence products, such as information on criminal networks or more comprehensive target profiles. However, they are unconvinced of the value of the domestic housebreaking packs that they must complete at every such incident. Their perception is that the process is time-consuming and repetitive, that much of the information is already gathered elsewhere and that little or no use is then made of it. The divisional commander may wish to consider looking at these matters as part of the future development of the division.

4.8 HMIC was pleased to note the division's commitment to making the best use of its resources and its focus, to this end, on public-facing duties. It is currently conducting a comprehensive review of resources, which aims to ensure that all posts and roles not currently public-facing are re-examined and, where possible, realigned.

4.9 From the evidence available, it is clear that a substantial amount of progress has already been made. Operation Align will build on this progress, realigning the division so that it can work effectively within the new council boundaries and continue to focus on and enhance the service it provides locally. While we will retain a keen interest in developments in this area, we are content to conclude that satisfactory progress has been made to address this area for review.

Area for Review 2 - Progress in all aspects of policy design, implementation and evaluation

4.10 During our 2004 review inspection we found that the following key force policies had still not been published:

• crime strategy;
• community safety strategy;
• corporate communications;
• firearms.

4.11 We are pleased to report that, with the exception of the crime strategy, these have now been published. As explained in the section under Recommendation 13, dealing with Crime Management, the force has taken the opportunity to focus on mainstreaming the National Intelligence Model ( NIM). HMIC is supportive of these efforts.

4.12 Now that the new board structure has settled in, the force has a clearly developed process and structure to identify new policy areas and develop, implement and monitor The required policies. At the highest level, the Business Change Board, under the Deputy Chief Constable, is responsible for ensuring that new policy areas emanating from ACPOS and other external sources are identified. Monitoring new and changing legislation to identify any emerging policy areas is the responsibility of the force's Policy Branch, while Corporate Development provides an overview of what is required to develop a new policy. Normal practice is for the relevant assistant chief constable or director to be given responsibility for this. Once developed and approved by the force executive, the policy is published by the Policy Branch who then monitors it on a regular basis.

4.13 The force has recognised the potential for confusion through its practice of publishing some of its policies in General Orders and others in the Chief Constable's memoranda. A review is planned to draw together all possible repositories of policy into one cohesive system. Short, meaningful policies supported by detailed standard operating procedures will then be produced. HMIC was pleased to note that the impact assessment process, to which all force policies are subjected, will also be examined as part of this review.

4.14 We are content to conclude our interest in this area.

Area for Review 3 - The success of the Force Communications Centre programme in terms of delivery

4.15 At the time of the primary inspection of Lothian and Borders in 2003, the Force Communications Centre ( FCC) had been operating for only a short time. Even at that early stage we found some operational problems emerging from what was, we acknowledged, a highly ambitious and complex strategic development. Our view at that time was that we would re-examine the service delivered by the FCC at the first review inspection. By the time of that first review in 2004, it was clear that the force had made progress in resolving some of the difficulties, and remained clearly committed to raising the quality of its services. Nevertheless certain substantial operational and technological problems that were having a significant effect on the service persisted, and would have to be re-examined at the second review inspection.

4.16 On reviewing the FCC during this inspection, we were pleased at the considerable progress made in collecting and analysing management information to inform operational decisions about the Centre. Indeed, HMIC was able to use this information to assess the FCC's performance. The following tables show the force's average monthly performance figures for each of the last three years. Some caution must be exercised, as technical difficulties and variations in processes mean that not all figures for all months of each year were available. Figures for 2006-07 cover the period April to December 2006.

Table 3: Telephone Answering Data

4.17 The above tables show that performance has improved despite an increase in demand. Nevertheless, the force is still failing to meet the target of answering 90% of 999 calls within ten seconds, as the statutory performance indicator requires. During its on-duty hours, the switchboard efficiently handles a large volume of calls. It only transfers these calls, though, neither taking details about incidents nor giving advice. Calls requiring these kinds of follow-up activity must instead be transferred to the assistance desk, where there can be considerable delays before they are picked up. For example, between April and December 2006, on average 15% of calls (or 6,225) per month were abandoned before the assistance desk could answer them.

4.18 HMIC acknowledges the force's commitment to resolve these matters. At the time of the inspection a superintendent and a chief inspector, under the personal leadership of the assistant chief constable responsible for the FCC, had been asked to review the facility. In December 2006, a position paper containing 44 recommendations was submitted to the force executive. The recommendations are still being considered. In the meantime the decision has been made to purchase a replacement telephony system to enhance the switchboard facility - an invitation to tender to this effect has been issued. This is in spite of the fact that the review position paper has recommended a detailed and independent review of the FCC's telephony architecture. HMIC is concerned that the decision has been made prior to the proposed independent review and without detailed analysis of processes and needs.

4.19 We are also concerned about the areas that the review process appears not to address. Though only an initial document, the position paper nevertheless outlines a substantial number of recommendations for change. What might have been useful, but appears not to have been carried out, is an exercise to map the FCC's processes. Process mapping enables one to highlight critical stages in a process and to look in more detail at performance specifically associated with these stages. Such an exercise could have generated useful baseline criteria against which to evaluate the impact of the recommended changes. With a service as complex and critical as the FCC, HMIC believes that such approach would have been good practice.

4.20 A further area for improvement that seems to have been overlooked is that of the existing structure of the FCC. The review appears to accept that the current switchboard, assistance desk, emergency desk and operational co-ordination set up cannot be changed. This is in spite of the fact, as mentioned above, that 15% of callers who are transferred from the switchboard to the assistance desk, abandon their calls before being answered. This finding is backed up by figures showing that when the switchboard is operating (0700 hours to 2300 hours), the assistance desk answers only 46% of calls within 30 seconds, and only 55% by 60 seconds. In an attempt to remedy the situation, the force is considering the option of requiring switchboard staff to provide more information, help and assistance to callers. HMIC would be concerned that spending more time on calls would further degrade switchboard performance and produce no concomitant rise in performance elsewhere. Without detailed process modelling to inform decisions and evaluate change it would be difficult to predict the impact accurately.

4.21 A further example of how useful such an exercise would be, emerged from a series of focus groups with FCC staff in which one particular technical shortcoming of the system was raised. That is, when a member of assistance desk staff logs onto the system, he/she cannot pick up calls from the current queue of callers. Instead, the system will only allow staff to start with the next incoming caller, a practice that undoubtedly detracts from the efficiency of the process. HMIC has since brought this matter to the attention of FCC managers.

4.22 The force rightly identifies the need to manage demand more effectively. Indeed nine of the review's recommendations are directed at demand management. We commend the detailed work that has been done to map demand, and will be interested to examine at a later date the way in which the force uses this information.

4.23 The force has also noted the difficulties arising from the need for assistance desk staff to record crime and vehicle accident reports from telephone calls and emails electronically. In the initial business case, the Input Section was subsumed by the assistance desk in an attempt to improve resilience and performance. Concerns have since been raised about the effect of this on the ability of assistance desk staff to deal with the public, as their core role demands. There is no easy solution to this problem. Staff believe that part of the reason behind it may be the increase in crime and vehicle accidents being reported by email rather than by telephone. The perception is that emailed reports take longer to input, and often require follow-up emails to officers for further information or clarification that could have captured at the time in one telephone call. The recommendation of the internal review is to employ additional staff on temporary contracts to meet this demand. HMIC is concerned that officers are typing out crime and vehicle accident crime reports, just to have FCC staff retype these onto the computerised recording system. If the next phase of the electronic notebook project is implemented (see National and Force Issues 6.9) then police officers will no longer have to continue this practice. We hope that the force will give priority to developing the necessary interface to allow such reports to be recorded directly onto the relevant system.

4.24 Other areas that the force is developing include staff training, the resilience of arrangements to deal with 999 calls, supervisory levels and career development opportunities for support staff. HMIC welcomes this work which, we believe, reflects the force's forward-looking approach to improving the entire FCC infrastructure. Though the FCC scores well on the force's regular customer surveys, the force is not complacent and recognises that the survey samples are drawn from members of the public who successfully contacted the FCC. We would also view the introduction of National Intelligence Model processes at the FCC as a positive step towards aligning the work of the FCC with the force's control strategy.

4.25 HMIC was pleased to see that in addition to the review team, a service improvement team has also been established to look at enhancing FCC activity. This team consists of the FCC chief inspector and members of police and support staff from all areas of the Centre. It actively seeks feedback not just from staff within the FCC but from the force as a whole. New service level agreements for stakeholders are also being developed. HMIC was impressed by the depth of their coverage as well as their very clear focus on quality, and we look forward with interest to their formal introduction in the near future.

4.26 Despite good improvement being made in some areas, we are concerned that the force has made no progress in the matter of command and control. This is in spite of raising the matter during our 2004 review inspection. In common with other forces, the force uses a call grading protocol with six different grades of call, as shown below:

4.27 At the present time the FCC handles only Grade 1 and 2 incidents. Grade 3 and 4 incidents are managed differently throughout the force. The question of whether the FCC's command and control function should be extended to cover all incidents has been widely debated. The force executive, together with the divisions, is currently considering possible management models for Grade 3 and 4 incidents. HMIC believes that this situation poses a degree of risk to the force, and is unsure why a decision on the matter has yet to be made. Irrespective of which command and control model it adopts, we would urge the force to establish a clear standard policy for its command and control function and to implement it as a matter of urgency.

4.28 HMIC has discovered that not all relevant calls from members of the public are raised as incidents on the force's Captor command and control system. The majority of telephone contacts on any given day are routed through the FCC. On Sunday August 6th 2006, of the 1,418 telephone calls received by the FCC, 859 (68.3%) were subsequently recorded as a Captor incident. Every time the FCC is in telephone contact with a member of the public, basic information about the call should initially be recorded on the Vantage customer relations management system. A review of the information held on Vantage for the above date revealed that of the 559 contacts that did not result in incidents being created on Captor, 42 probably should have been.

4.29 Of these 42 records 14, or 1% of all telephone calls received, had been generated on Captor first, with the details then updated onto Vantage. This contravenes the force's standard operating procedure and means that the relevant incident number is not recorded on the Vantage system. The FCC management team has since resolved this matter.

4.30 Of the remaining 28 records, the information recorded on Vantage suggested that 22 incidents (1.6% of all calls received) may have merited police attendance in addition to being captured on Captor. Three instances that did not result in an incident being raised are described below:

• a distressed woman dialled 999 stating that she had been assaulted following a domestic argument. It was recorded that she did not wish police attendance and no incident was created;
• a complaint about a "peeping tom";
• a report of an overdose victim who had walked out of hospital.

4.31 The recorded information on the remaining six incidents was of such poor quality that it is not possible to establish whether or not the operator had acted appropriately.

4.32 At the time of the inspection, FCC procedures did not include routine supervisory checks of Vantage records prior to the end of shifts. HMIC has informed FCC management of this matter and remedial action is being taken.

4.33 The lack of a cohesive central policy on command and control also appears to be having an adverse effect on what the force terms x-ray incidents. These are incidents, normally of Grade 3 or 4, that are kept open until all outstanding tasks are completed. On February 2nd 2007, 708 x-ray incidents were still open, as shown in the table below.

4.34 HMIC is concerned by the number of incidents that remain open, and hopes that adopting a clear standard policy for command and control will improve this situation.

Table 4: Distribution of Open Incidents

4.35 While inspecting the FCC, we took the opportunity to interview managers and members of the review teams, and held focus groups with other FCC staff. The findings revealed that staff were aware of the various difficulties, were willing to put things right and displayed a good level of morale.

4.36 The FCC does have many positive features, and the force is to be commended for the improvements it has made so far. However, as illustrated above, there are some substantial issues to be dealt with before we can conclude our interest in this area.

Area for Review 4 - Corporate Communications

4.37 The force's Corporate Communication strategy was published following extensive, internal and external consultation. Incorporating the force's approach to diversity, its content also rightly acknowledges the public's desire for more visible and accessible policing, setting out nine clear and concise aims aligned to the force's wider goals to this end. The strategy also aspires to instil a culture of communication based on sharing knowledge and information throughout the organisation. In so doing, the force recognises the crucial role and importance of working together with communities in the force area. Staff are regularly informed and, where appropriate consulted, on matters relating to their role and to the service overall.

4.38 The force sees the strategy as a constantly evolving document and intends to evaluate its success through further formal and informal, external and internal consultation exercises. It is also reviewing new legislation and the relevance of the nine current aims.

4.39 The Corporate Communication division, supported by a single divisional administrator, is divided into two sections - the corporate communication development unit and the media relations section. The former has a manager, a deputy, and six further staff working in internal and external communication through strategy development, web and interactive systems design and development, graphic design, desktop publishing, video/ DVD production and events support. The media relations section has a manager and four additional staff dealing with the media and public relations. The post of head of department, which oversees both sections, is vacant but has recently been advertised nationally.

To make the best use of existing and emerging technology, the force has introduced a number of web-based initiatives. These include a clear and easy to use internet site, involvement with a multi-agency website, an electronic newsletter from the Chief Constable, the use of video conferencing and the first police Web Chat facility in Scotland. The force was one of the first in Scotland to introduce a text message, e-mail and voice message portal alert service to keep local communities up-to-date with police information. (See also National and Force Issues 6.1) Where relevent the force has produced a wide range of media products including leaflets, posters, videos and DVDs.

4.40 At a strategic level, three out of the twelve high-level projects current underway in the force will deliver major improvements to force communication. These involve the introduction of a content management system to enhance the force intranet, the development of a consistent corporate identity to improve visibility and accessibility, and the introduction of force-wide NIM compliant e-briefing.

4.41 Though still relatively new, the published strategy seems capable of delivering an effective and efficient communication service for the force. HMIC is pleased to note this progress and concludes its interest in this area.

Area for Review 5 - Progress in preparing the information strategy and indeed the wider action plans contained in the Race Equality Scheme and being pursued by the Diversity Advisor

4.42 Since our 2004 review inspection, the force has successfully incorporated its Race Equality scheme information strategy into its Corporate Communication strategy. We commend the force for effectively mainstreaming this area of work within corporate communications policy. We are also pleased that effective ownership of the strategy has been established with the recent publication of the Corporate Communications Action Plan, overseen by the Reassurance Board. The force recognises that, as a public body, its communication processes are statutorily bound to eliminate unlawful racial discrimination and encourage good relations between people of different groups. We note its intention to go beyond this obligation and strive to provide the same high level of service to all communities, regardless of race, gender, disability, sexual orientation, faith and age. We welcome this aim and consider it to be good practice.

4.43 The Race Equality Scheme action plan is now overseen by the force's Diversity Implementation group and is wholly subsumed within the Multi-Equality Scheme action plan. Recently the force has been considering how co-ordination of the Multi-Equality Scheme action plans, including the Race Equality Scheme element, should be developed.

4.44 Finally under this area for review, HMIC would like to comment on the developing role of the force's 'community of critical friends' - a group of 10 Police Board lay advisers who offer advice and guidance on all aspects of diversity. As well as retaining responsibility for reviewing how the force deals with hate crime, the group has been given access to specialist areas of work such as training, complaints and cid. Members are also now able to carry out thematic inspections on any matters of concern they may have. The first such inspection focused on the force's National Equal Opportunities ( NEOTS) training. The resulting report was submitted in the first instance to the full Joint Police Board in July 2006. Since then, the force's Diversity Training team has been acting on its recommendations. HMIC believes this praiseworthy development to be good practice.

4.45 We commend the force for its progress in this area and are content to conclude our interest in it.

Area for Review 6 - Progress in common goals and objectives being identified and set by partnerships, against which suitable performance indicators could be developed

4.46 Lothian and Borders Police is an active participant in community planning. Each of its four divisions works effectively with their respective local authority and has staff who are co-located with local authority staff. Underpinning these arrangements is the force's strategic framework for community planning, which recognises the importance of joint working.

4.47 Each division operates a National Intelligence Model ( NIM) tasking and co-ordinating forum, which ensures that partners work together to identify and achieve common goals. A review process makes sure that subsequent activities are efficiently and effectively managed. Within 'A' division specific NIM training is provided to partner agencies, and there are plans to extend this to the rest of the force. Nevertheless, the success of these fora depends on the necessary analytical support being available. HMIC supports the force's efforts to recruit and assign analysts to each forum as soon as possible.

4.48 The continuing realignment of Edinburgh's 'A' Division deserves specific comment here. The new policing structure is conterminous with the city's Council internal boundaries. The city's six Neighbourhood Areas are divided into 12 Neighbourhood Partnerships, each with an inspector whose role it is to develop community engagement and local partnership working. Here again the structure and practices of NIM are used in identifying partnership responses to local problems.

4.49 At the same time the force is rolling out a NIM-based Community and Police Partnership ( CAPP) programme, aimed at locally resolving lower level, but still important, community problems.

4.50 Though these structures are new to the force, HMIC is confident that the energy and effort of the current management team will ensure the success of the project, and is happy to conclude its interest in this area for review.

Area for Review 10 - Progress made against the force's review of traffic wardens

4.51 The force now has a clear plan for the future use and deployment of its traffic wardens. In the territorial divisions outside Edinburgh ('E', 'F' and 'G'), their numbers, traditional range of duties and job description will stay the same. The same will be true of the six traffic wardens who work to a well-defined and narrow remit at Edinburgh Airport in 'A' Division. That leaves nine traffic warden supervisors and forty nine traffic wardens covering the rest of the city.

4.52 Since parking offences within the city were decriminalised, the wardens have worked in a central unit. Their core function, limited by their legislative powers, is to maintain the free flow of traffic on Edinburgh's five Greenway corridors. These powers include the following:

• issuing Greenways Fixed Penalty Tickets ( FPTS) for stationary offences only;
• directing traffic (on a static point);
• impounding vehicles for Greenway or obstruction offences; and
• issuing endorsable Conditional Offers for parking/obstruction on pedestrian crossings and asking for driving licences in the event of such offences.

4.53 The City of Edinburgh Council will be seeking to decriminalise Greenways and bus lane infractions within the next one to two years, as part of its strategy in planning for the new tram system and for tackling congestion. The force is now planning to rationalise the strength and role of its centralised traffic warden unit with this in mind.

4.54 At the time of our 2004 review inspection, the force was looking into the possibility of legislative change to extend the type of duties that traffic wardens could perform. This is no longer the case. Nevertheless, the rationalisation of the central traffic wardens unit will include their re-designation to traffic support wardens.

4.55 The force has already begun to employ some staff as traffic support wardens. Their additional duties include monitoring speeds at locations of local concern, monitoring the Automatic Number Plate Recognition ( ANPR) system at the Force Communications Centre and participating in intelligence-led education initiatives. Speed monitoring is carried out by wardens trained in using hand-held radar devices, and results in warning letters sent to the registered owners of vehicles observed breaking the speed limit. This monitoring also provides intelligence for Road Policing enforcement.

4.56 Restructuring the central wardens unit will produce a new establishment of twenty-four traffic support wardens, three team leaders, one support driver, two administrative support assistants (including Vehicle Recovery Scheme administration), one support manager and one police sergeant. The Joint Police Board has already approved this new structure which, it is intended, will yield some efficiency savings in future years. Reductions in staff numbers will be sought through voluntary redundancies and opportunities for transfer elsewhere within the force. The relevant trade unions have been involved in consultations.

4.57 This new central unit will remain part of the operational support division. Staff will therefore be available for major events, such as football matches, parades and the Edinburgh Festival, and will receive additional duties through the tasking and co-ordinating process.

4.58 HMIC is content with progress in this area and, having examined future development plans, we conclude our interest in this matter.

Area for Review 11 - Progress in developing existing systems that will allow wider use of payroll and overtime systems to cost activities that will further assist in identifying the costs of pursuing force priorities

4.59 In adopting the national model used in England and Wales, the force has taken the lead in developing activity-based costing for Scottish forces. The model will produce better management information and more accurate costings of activities, which will in turn help to direct resources efficiently and effectively in pursuit of force priorities.

4.60 Using the national model will enable the force to compare its performance against a family of 'similar' forces, applying a knowledge of the local context to determine its comparative efficiency. The force will also be able to identify costs per incident more accurately, the better to inform future funding decisions.

4.61 The capacity for continuous sampling that modern technology allows, means that more relevant and meaningful activity-based costing data can be captured. Thus more frequent and timely information for the costing model can be recorded. It is envisaged that in the future, officers' electronic notebooks will link directly into the Duty Management system, thereby reducing the need for either manual data entry or additional sampling to capture data.

4.62 A number of Scottish forces are also working towards a common ledger and account code structure. This would permit more and better inter-force comparisons, help to identify efficiencies and economies of scale, and produce better results from activity-based costing.

4.63 With the work on the joint ledger proposal underway, no significant work has been done on the force's Kernal payroll system. It is expected that after April 2007, the force and its joint ledger partners will review the future of Kernal to determine a way forward for costing.

4.64 The force is developing the activity-based costing system on a step by step basis, on behalf of ACPOS for all Scottish forces. Many aspects of this are still at an early stage. Together with Audit Scotland we will retain an interest in this area.

Area for Review 13 - Progress in updating the force's firearms policy

4.65 The force's firearms policy, supported by comprehensive standard operation procedures, has been approved, published and made available to all members of staff through the force intranet. A chief officer-led review process is in place, while a unique identifier numbering system for future versions of the documents will provide a useful audit trail of subsequent revisions. This satisfactory progress allows us to conclude our interest in this area.

Area for Review 14 - The impact of the new shift system and call grading system on resource deployment

4.66 HMIC was disappointed at what little progress has been made with the force's current shift system. At our 2004 review inspection we had supported Audit Scotland's view that the force should carry out a thorough review its shift system, following a period of relative stability and using revised and improved success criteria. Such a fundamental review has not been carried out. The force did, however, set up a small review team to look at the Audit Scotland recommendations concerning the use of opportunity days and shift overlaps. In consequence, there is a perception amongst staff that the situation has improved, with better use being made of the opportunity days in particular.

4.67 We have been informed that a full review of the current shift system it to be carried out once the new Chief Constable is in place. This was agreed to at the November 2006 meeting of the Joint Negotiating Consultative Committee meeting, at which the Joint Board branch was asked to re-sign the current workforce agreement for a further six months.

4.68 During the inspection, operational managers continued to voice concerns about the impact of the current shift system on resilience. We were nonetheless impressed by the enthusiasm and willingness of staff to make the system work. In some areas of the force, specialist units have agreed to adopt locally agreed non-standard shift patterns. These patterns, which allow staff to perform their necessary duties, have only been introduced with the consent of those working in the units. Indeed in some cases the units have themselves taken the initiative and suggested alternative shift patterns based on the needs of their roles. The local Federation is involved in these negotiations and makes sure that any proposed pattern does not breach working time regulations and is in the best interests of its members.

4.69 A positive effect of the shift pattern has been the onus on operational commanders to take particular care to deploy their resources efficiently and effectively. In many areas, commanders are continually reviewing how and where their officers are deployed and are taking steps to ensure that as many as possible are performing public-facing duties. This is being done in various ways, including replacing police officers with support staff where possible and by looking closely at what duties officers are performing and how they are deployed. For example, the new divisional commander of 'A' Division carried out a full resource review that highlighted anomalies in how some officers are used and deployed. A structured approach to resolving this matter has begun, its primary focus being to return officers to public-facing operational duties.

4.70 It was clear from our 2004 review inspection that the force was having problems matching resources to demand under the current shift system. At that time the force seemed clear about the need for a fundamental review of the system. This has not been carried out, however. The shift system is popular with operational officers and because of this the local Federation is supportive of its beneficial effects on the work-life balance. Yet all sides recognise the difficulties of matching resources to demand under the current system and it is accepted, as a result, that a fundamental review is still required. There is now an intention to do this in the new financial year when the incoming Chief Constable takes up his post, though of course it will be his decision. And so while HMIC is disappointed with the relative lack of progress so far, the situation presents a new opportunity to address this important matter. We will retain an interest in this area.

Area for Review 15 - The impact of the implementation of the call grading protocol

4.71 In our 2004 review inspection report, we acknowledged the force's work in introducing and reviewing an effective and consistently applied call grading system. Our continuing interest in this area centred on the force's intention to market its call grading protocol and the need to identify and capture relevant management information.

4.72 HMIC is content to note the various methods by which the force has sought to raise awareness internally - the call grading protocol is available on the intranet, team briefings on the subject have been held across the force and an aide-mémoire has been issued to each officer. To inform the public, the force has placed the protocol on its internet site and included an article about call grading in the newsletters of each of the public authorities within the force area. In addition, divisional commanders have written to each of their elected members to make them aware of the system.

4.73 We are also pleased to see that performance information on graded calls is included in the force's Performance and Activity Management ( PAM) framework and is therefore discussed by members of the force executive and divisional commanders at PAM meetings. As well as examining the number of calls attended within target times against each of the grades, the force also records the occasions when attendance times have not been entered against each grade. Monitoring performance in this way should make it easier for the force to identify and deal with emerging problems. That said, HMIC notes that attendance times not being entered remains a significant issue for Grade 3 and 4 calls.

4.74 We are satisfied with what progress has been made and conclude our interest in this area.

Area for Review 17 - The nature of duties undertaken and planned within the Professional Standards Department

4.75 The force's Complaints and Conduct division continues to deal with a considerable volume of sensitive and challenging investigations into allegations made against force staff. These enquiries are generally reactive in nature, and are allocated and worked through using a National Intelligence Model ( NIM) tasking structure to ensure that appropriate priority is given to each case.

4.76 The force has introduced the 'Safecall' confidential helpline that allows all staff to report, in confidence, any perceived wrongdoing in any aspect of force business. While at the moment use of the facility is limited, calls have brought about successful investigations and there are plans to re-market the helpline in the near future.

4.77 In 2005 a successful business case was made to increase the resources of the Professional Standards unit ( PSU), which forms part of the Complaints and Conduct division. The aim was to enhance the unit's intelligence structure and its capacity to conduct robust, proactive operations and investigations. At the same time the unit's first corporate strategic assessment referred to a move towards a more covert approach to tackling certain misconduct issues, as proposed following our 2004 review inspection.

4.78 Though the PSU is currently handling a number of covert or proactive projects, the majority of investigations remain reactive in nature. A recently appointed analyst has only limited experience in the PSU role, and a form of mentoring is to be introduced to enhance this person's skills and knowledge base. However, a number of police officers recently recruited to the unit have considerable investigative and covert experience, presenting the opportunity for a more intelligence-led, proactive approach. HMIC is encouraged by these appointments, and proposes that the unit's staff be given the opportunity to liaise with similar PSUs in the UK in order to share good practice and experience.

4.79 Given the level and direction of the progress there, we are satisfied that we can conclude its interest in this area.

« Previous | Contents | Next »