Source · Select Committees · Home Affairs Committee
Recommendation 7
7
Not Addressed
Paragraph: 70
Police forces and Home Office failing to collect local ethnic confidence data or plan effectively
Conclusion
Given the seriousness of the issue we are particularly alarmed by the failure of police forces and the Home Office to have proper plans in place to address the confidence gap, or even to be gathering the basic evidence and data they need at local force level to understand and tackle the problem. Lack of confidence data by ethnicity at a local force level also makes it much harder to hold local forces to account for concerns about BME communities’ confidence in the police. The Metropolitan Police provides up-to-date, clear information on public perceptions by ethnicity but few other forces provide similar or comparable information. This is not good enough.
Government Response Summary
The government's response discusses progress in handling complaints and conduct, and the importance of granular data on disproportionality, but it does not address the committee's specific concern about the failure to gather local force-level confidence data by ethnicity.
Paragraph Reference:
70
Government Response
Not Addressed
HM Government
Not Addressed
The Government welcomes the progress made by the NPCC through the work of former Deputy Chief Constable Phil Cain and Chief Constable Craig Guildford. Their reports highlight both the positive work undertaken by forces to improve the proportionate handling of complaints and conduct allegations, but also the continued challenges to ensure that the system is fair for all. CC Guildford’s report, which covers a broader data set, suggests an improving picture, indicative of supervisors responding positively to the legislative changes introduced by the Government in February 2020. The report also demonstrates the importance of looking at more granular data, given that the national picture is disproportionately influenced by a smaller number of forces. The Home Office is engaging closely with the NPCC, and other stakeholders, ensuring that concerns of disproportionality are being tackled head-on, both at National Complaints and Misconduct Working Group (NCMWG), but also locally within the framework of regional groups. The Government is improving its collection of misconduct and criminal investigations data and the first data will be available in a new standalone publication in May. This data will be highly beneficial in monitoring future progress. For the first time we will be able to collect ethnicity data at several stages of the process: from initial assessments and referrals to the Reflective Practice Review Process, to case to answer determinations and disciplinary outcomes. This is critical to help understand exactly where in the system disproportionality exists and, crucially, how to focus efforts to tackle it. Regular inspections of forces by HMICFRS are a critical tool in ensuring the effectiveness of forces and the Home Office would welcome future inspection of force Professional Standards Departments (PSDs). PSDs were last inspected in 2017, with the national findings publicly reported in the overarching PEEL legitimacy report. As a result of the Government’s overhaul of the police complaints and discipline systems in 2020, it was agreed with the Home Office that HMICFRS would give forces time for those legislative changes to bed in, before they are re-inspected. The Home Office will continue to work closely with HMICFRS, and other policing stakeholders, when planning the specific terms of future inspections. The NPCC should conduct a specific review into this issue [BME representation in PSDs] and report within a year.