Recommendation 32

HM Government Accepted

Police forces should be striving to become more representative of the communities they serve. The policing sector recognises the long-standing challenge that recruiting a more diverse and representative police service presents and has made this ambition clear, including through the most senior board, the National Policing Board’s strategic policing priorities. The current unprecedented recruitment drive through the Police Uplift Programme (PUP) is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to make progress on representation and we have ensured that there is now a comprehensive programme of work being delivered, working with all 43 forces. The Police Uplift Programme is supporting forces with a variety of attraction and recruitment strategies, whilst delivering a national campaign that has been designed to reach diverse audiences. Sharing best practice, engagement with police staff associations, upskilling recruitment teams and enhanced data capture are just some of the efforts being made to improve police diversity. The National Audit Office (NAO) recently published a Value for Money report on the Police Uplift Programme. We are pleased to see that that it recognises the programme is being managed well and is on course to deliver value for money, and the useful areas highlighted through the recommendations. Police forces must decide which tactical options to deploy based on their own barriers and solutions to meet diversity challenges, however the programme has significantly enhanced the support offered across five critical strands of activity—Access, Data, Attraction, Processes and Trust. Access: connecting the police to communities that feel distanced from policing or have never considered a career in policing. The Police Uplift Programme hosted a series of positive action events and webinars in January 2021, aimed at encouraging groups with particular protected characteristics to join by engaging with police staff associations and serving officers. It has also supported the development of a widening access course to enable those changing careers and those without formal qualifications to meet entry requirements for policing with a pre-application qualification. The campaign’s ‘joiningthepolice’ website promotes inclusivity in policing, with advice on the recruitment process and on positive action, and dedicated pages for national staff support associations representing different groups in policing. The Police Uplift Programme has also invested in these associations’ own online presences to ensure that they can maximise the opportunity to engage positively with those who visit their websites. Data: improving insight and understanding through data collection and analysis. The Police Uplift Programme has been clear that better data is needed to fully understand the barriers that exist, from attraction through to recruitment and retention. Thanks to the Police Uplift Programme, new and improved data is in place nationally to track progress and bring forces to account through the scrutiny processes, both at the National Policing Board and through PCCs and Chief Constables. The Police Uplift Programme has transformed the collection and understanding of national data on police recruitment. This has been fundamental in supporting process improvements, many of which have a clear goal of increasing representation; for example, ensuring vetting is not presenting a disproportionate barrier to some groups. The Home Office now publishes national recruitment data on a quarterly basis, and the Police Uplift Programme shares management information with forces monthly to enable the Programme and forces to understand pipelines and the success of attraction strategies. Better data has also enabled the Police Uplift Programme to support forces through the development of detailed data dashboards benchmarking progress against the proportion of the local community from an ethnic minority background. Allied to the Programme’s dedicated workstream, which uses subject matter experts from forces, this enables bespoke support to be provided where needed. Internal campaigns within policing also encourage more officers to declare their demographic details and further improve our understanding through better data. Exit interviews now include the collection of more detailed data on diversity, service profile, rank, diversity and reason for leaving, to help forces understand retention. Attraction: diversifying our reach to communities and supporting local activity. The national Police Uplift communications campaign targets underrepresented groups and features across a range of marketing channels to reach people from different backgrounds via multicultural marketing channels. Audience segmentation is being used to provide policing with a greater understanding of the barriers and motivations that exist for specific groups within the population, identifying where targeted communications can have the most impact to expand the pool of potential recru