FOI 174706
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST REFERENCE NO: 174706
I write in connection with your request for information which was received on 25th May 2022. Please find below the response to your request:
- How many misconduct investigations are conducted each year (which originated internally within your force and have been investigated locally or independently by the IOPC? Please provide 3 years of data)
- How many of these relate to Abuse of Power for Sexual Purpose (APSP) allegations?
- How many of the APSP cases are referred to the IOPC?
- How many cases relate to allegations of Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG)?
- How many cases relate to other forms of Police Sexual Misconduct (PSM)?
- How many cases relate to sexist/misogynistic behaviour?
- In how many of the identified investigation types (APSP/PSM/VAWG/misogynistic behaviour) has the alleged offender been previously investigated for similar allegations?
- Under what circumstances would PSM/APSP allegations be referred to the IOPC?
- How many of the ‘offenders’ are male/female?
- How many of the victims are male/female?
- What is the ratio of male:female employees?
- What proportion of senior officers or senior staff are female?
- Do officers & staff have to work towards performance driven targets? If so what are the targets?
- What work is being actively undertaken to identify cases of APSP/PSM?
- What additional work is being conducted to establish why this type of police misconduct is occurring (APSP/PSM)?
- What has been identified from this work?
- What is being done to address the current police culture in order to make policing a more ethical and inclusive workplace (particularly in relation to sexist/misogynistic behaviours)?
- Who is ultimately responsible for addressing the policing culture?
- What control measures are in place to safeguard against misogynistic or sexist attitudes/VAWG/APSP/PSM.
- What training is given in these areas? How often is this delivered? Have all officers and staff received this training?
- How do you ensure police officers and staff are familiar with the code of ethics? Do they need to sign a declaration to confirm they have read and understand the document? How often?
- Do the government provide any support to tackle the issues identified (APSP/PSM/VAWG/misogynistic)? If so what?
- Do you have a specialist department to investigate internal allegations of this nature?
- Are the outcomes of the identified misconduct investigations advertised within the force? If so, are all outcomes published, or is there a differentiation dependent on the case type and severity? Where are they published?
- How do you ensure that senior officers and senior staff are held accountable and their actions are transparent to the rest of the force?
- Is there an available whistleblowing process?
- How is this advertised?
- What support is in place for whistle-blowers?
- Does your force engage with the local community/community agencies in order to encourage them to report inappropriate behaviour? If so how and what agencies?
- Do you have any supportive action initiatives to ensure a representative workforce? If so please explain what these are.
Reply
- How many misconduct investigations are conducted each year (which originated internally within your force and have been investigated locally or independently by the IOPC? Please provide 3 years of data)
|
2019/2020 |
58 |
|
2020/2021 |
71 |
|
2021/2022 |
107 |
|
2022 to 30/06/2022 |
24 |
- How many of these relate to Abuse of Power for Sexual Purpose (APSP) allegations?
17
- How many of the APSP cases are referred to the IOPC?
They are all referred to the IOPC, APSP is a mandatory referral.
- How many cases relate to allegations of Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG)?
30
- How many cases relate to other forms of Police Sexual Misconduct (PSM)?
14
- How many cases relate to sexist/misogynistic behaviour?
2
- In how many of the identified investigation types (APSP/PSM/VAWG/misogynistic behaviour) has the alleged offender been previously investigated for similar allegations?
12
- Under what circumstances would PSM/APSP allegations be referred to the IOPC?
All APSP are referred to the IOPC, APSP is a mandatory referral. PSM is referred if it is a Criminal Offence, Domestic Abuse, Discrimination, Seniority of Officer, Vulnerability of a member of the public, Life Altering Impact caused to a member of the public and Serious Corruption.
Section 17 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 requires West Mercia Police, when refusing to provide such information (because the information is exempt) to provide you the applicant with a notice which: (a) states that fact, (b) specifies the exemption in question and (c) states (if that would not otherwise be apparent) why the exemption applies.
The exemption applicable to the information is:
Sec 21(1) Information Reasonably Accessible by Other Means
This is an Absolute, class based exemption.
The information that you require is already available
- How many of the ‘offenders’ are male/female?
|
Male |
59 |
|
Female |
7 |
|
Male/Female - Equal Blame |
1 |
- How many of the victims are male/female?
|
10. How many of the victims are male/female? |
|
|
Male |
6 |
|
Female |
60 |
|
Male/Female - Equal Blame |
1 |
- What is the ratio of male:female employees?
No information held
- What proportion of senior officers or senior staff are female?
Section 17 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 requires West Mercia Police, when refusing to provide such information (because the information is exempt) to provide you the applicant with a notice which: (a) states that fact, (b) specifies the exemption in question and (c) states (if that would not otherwise be apparent) why the exemption applies.
The exemption applicable to the information is:
Sec 21(1) Information Reasonably Accessible by Other Means
This is an Absolute, class based exemption.
The information that you require is already available
- Do officers & staff have to work towards performance driven targets? If so what are the targets?
No. There are a broad range of measures on which officers and staff are held to account for their performance, however, very few of them are actual targets and these come from national frameworks. For example, there is a national target for 90% of 999 calls to be answered within 10 seconds. The force Deployment Principles establish that officers will aim to respond to grade 2 priority incidents within 2 hours. Neither of these targets, however, is used to manage the performance of individual officers or contact centre staff.
The force maintains a scorecard-based Performance Management Framework which manages the performance of teams, but this does not establish any targets and is not intended to manage individual performance.
The workforce is assessed against the Competency and Values Framework that has been established by the College of Policing to frame line management of performance.
- What work is being actively undertaken to identify cases of APSP/PSM?
- inputs to frontline officers and supervisors about the signs of APSP and how to refer concerns
- routine publicising of Integrity Line and SpeakUp campaign
- inputs to internal teams who engage with victims of crime (VAL, survey team, DARO) to understand signs of APSP
- work (in progress) with Learning and Development to broaden this to external partners
- What additional work is being conducted to establish why this type of police misconduct is occurring (APSP/PSM)?
- plan (in progress) to debrief dismissed perpetrator
- working with regional forces to share best practice
- What has been identified from this work?
No info held – currently too early to say
- What is being done to address the current police culture in order to make policing a more ethical and inclusive workplace (particularly in relation to sexist/misogynistic behaviours)?
- The new Chief Constable has made INCLUSIVE a new Force Value
- A new INCLUSIVE governance framework has been introduced at Strategic, tactical and operational levels to better direct and resource activity to make us more inclusive.
- We actively survey staff to measure our journey on becoming “a great place to work”
Several actions are taking place to reduce the prevalence and impact of sexist behaviour:-
- A programme called “Speak Out” encourages the reporting of inappropriate behaviours with associated updated and improved practice around supporting colleagues
- The “Not in my Force; Not in my Profession” moniker is used as an internal and external marketing tool – when investigations are concluded and sanctions delivered
- The HeForShe campaign involves a cohort of male supervisors leaders who work with female colleagues to improve the opportunities for women within the organisation
- The national activity around Violence against Women & Girls (VAWG) also has an internal context / activity
- Who is ultimately responsible for addressing the policing culture?
Chief Constable and Senior Team – see link to Q12
- What control measures are in place to safeguard against misogynistic or sexist attitudes/VAWG/APSP/PSM.
As per 14
- What training is given in these areas? How often is this delivered? Have all officers and staff received this training?
- as per 14.
- Also we have circulated the NPCC APSP video, current update roughly 62%, continued push to improve completion rate
- CPD event to all frontline officers in November 2021 focused on APSP and PSM
- How do you ensure police officers and staff are familiar with the code of ethics? Do they need to sign a declaration to confirm they have read and understand the document? How often?
This is in the form of a letter that is being sent out to our new cohorts which cover it. West Mercia also have an integrity health check where officers are asked to sign a document.
This is also discussed as part of the individuals Personal Development Review which takes place every 12 months
- Do the government provide any support to tackle the issues identified (APSP/PSM/VAWG/misogynistic)? If so what?
Current VAWG taskforce and NPCC Guidance.
- Do you have a specialist department to investigate internal allegations of this nature?
Yes
- Are the outcomes of the identified misconduct investigations advertised within the force? If so, are all outcomes published, or is there a differentiation dependent on the case type and severity? Where are they published?
West Mercia Police only publishes outcomes of officer dismissals following Misconduct Hearings/Accelerated Misconduct Hearings, this is as required in Police (Conduct) Regulations 2020. Dismissed officers will be named unless it has previously been agreed for one of the specific reasons in Conduct Regulations that the proceedings should be held in private.
- How do you ensure that senior officers and senior staff are held accountable and their actions are transparent to the rest of the force?
No information held – this would be covered in the governance produced by the Police and Crime Commission
- Is there an available whistleblowing process?
Yes
- How is this advertised?
Available internally through the intranet; externally is accessible through the West Mercia Police website.
- What support is in place for whistle-blowers?
Support is available through People and Organisational Development or Professional standards. Also, individuals could approach UNISON/staff associations, or through the Police Crime and Commissioner.
- Does your force engage with the local community/community agencies in order to encourage them to report inappropriate behaviour? If so how and what agencies?
As per Q14 re: external agencies. Those involved will be local authority and 3rd sector agencies who have engagement with key APSP victim groups (e.g. mental health, adult social care, DA and sexual violence support)
- Do you have any supportive action initiatives to ensure a representative workforce? If so please explain what these are.
Yes we are currently working through a number of initiatives;
The creation on an advocacy and ambassador scheme with the idea being these officers will be trained about recruitment and will attend events speaking positively and passionately about our force.
We have identified the most diverse postcodes around our force area. We are in the process of completing targeted letter drops to these areas advertising that we are recruiting.
Engagement with IAGs to understand specific publications/channels utilised by under represented communities to enable more targeted recruitment campaigns.
Designed more effective communications to accurately record expression of interest data collated at recruitment events meaning we can now contact positive action candidates and invite them to attend our discovery sessions. These sessions run monthly providing information about what the police job role is and how to join. We then run another session to assist positive action candidates with their assessment center. Lastly we offer an interview session again assisting our positive action candidates through the process.
Organised and helped co-ordinate a ‘change video’ that can be used for both targeted recruitment campaigns as part of wider positive action communications plans.
Attendance at planned targeted and non targeted recruitment events i.e. Birmingham LGBTQ Pride and Three Counties Show
Continue to review recruitment data to understand disproportionately at any stage of the recruitment process, the reasons and apply specific positive action.
Launched a leavers survey. The results are published every quarter for review and feed into the Workforce Planning Group.
To launch ‘Stay with us’ intranet site which will encourage those individuals from underrepresented groups you are thinking of leaving to discuss their reasons with the positive action team prior to resigning.
Create a more inclusive working environment through a series of blogs describing inclusive behaviour. (the first blog being released this week is ‘What is Misgendering’.
(Raising awareness amongst managers on leading and managing within an inclusive work environment which may lead to the retention of officers/staff from underrepresented groups.)
Assigned mentors to individuals seeking to apply for the sergeant promotion boards in June/July 2022.
Contact all individuals including those on maternity leave providing details of discovery sessions in preparation for those applying for sergeant promotion.
Discovery sessions taken place in support of those applying for sergeant promotion to positive action candidates to assist with a more balanced representation within the management chain.