Greater Manchester Police “requires improvement”, says Police Effectiveness report

Greater Manchester Police “requires improvement at keeping people safe and reducing crimes”, says the latest Police Effectiveness report.

The report, produced by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS), says GMP ‘requires improvement’ for both protecting vulnerable people and investigating crime and reducing re-offending.

The report says that although the force has made progress in some areas since 2016, its approach to protecting vulnerable people has deteriorated, thus resulting in a lower grading this year.

Last year, the force received an overall rating of ‘good’.

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The report pointed out that GMP is “inconsistent” in both the quality of investigations and how they are carried out. It notes that GMP “routinely does not attend incidents within suitable timescales” which later affect the initial investigation.

The report also notes GMP has “effective processes” in place to reduce re-offending and to manage offenders who pose a risk to the public.

However, during the inspection, it was found that once officers arrive at the scene, “they generally complete initial investigations to a satisfactory standard” and “more serious and specialist investigations were of a better quality, with appropriate investigation plans, good supervision and recorded victim care.”

It also highlights “the force’s ability to match neighbourhood officers to the public demand for its services” as a cause for concern due to a lack of resources.

Another cause of concern was the ‘failure to respond appropriately to some people who are vulnerable and at risk’ – missing early opportunities to safeguard victims and secure evidence at the scene, and putting victims at risk.

Whilst GMP was praised for its effectiveness at identifying vulnerable people, its initial response to the vulnerable requires improvement. Frontline officers and staff understand vulnerability as a main strategic priority. Officers and staff have been provided with training, raising awareness of the need to identify and safeguard vulnerable victims and others who are identified as vulnerable

Again, it was found that GMP has high numbers of incidents, including those with vulnerable people, that officers are unable to attend within the assessed and graded response time.

The report notes that, at times, the force “is not able to support vulnerable victims or gather evidence at crime scenes”, adding that the force is aware of this problem and has plans in place to manage its demand better and improve its attendance times.

Despite its shortfalls, GMP has “effective partnership working with other organisations, such as local authorities or mental health services” which allows it to “maintain continuing support and longer-term safeguarding for the people who have been identified as most vulnerable.”

The report also found that the force only took action against an offender in 11.4 percent of crimes, compared with 15.6 percent in England and Wales. The force has a charge or summons rate of 7.2 percent, compared to the England and Wales rate of 10.2 percent.

Areas for improvement given were taking steps to ensure that all available evidence is recorded at scenes of crime, ensure there is regular and active supervision of investigations to improve quality and progress, and implementing a process to obtain feedback from victims of domestic abuse.

Recommendations suggested improving its understanding of demand for its services and take appropriate action to ensure demand is managed more effectively, improving its ability to respond appropriately to calls for service and improve the initial investigative response it provides to all vulnerable victims.

Chief Superintendent Neil Evans said: “Naturally we are disappointed that HMICFRS concludes that GMP ‘requires improvement.’ Whilst we would assert that the Force has made improvements in certain areas over recent months, it would be reckless of us to challenge the conclusions on what is such an important issue.

“Where we take issue with HMICFRS is that nowhere in their report do they describe the wider context facing GMP. For example, we dare to suggest that the issues they raise may have something to do with the approximately £180 Million reduction in funding over recent years. This has seen a reduction of nearly 2,000 officers and 1,000 police staff – nearly 25% of the workforce. GMP receives 186 999 calls per 1,000 of the population, where the national average is 135. Yet GMP’s reduction in funding has been greater than the national average because we depend on more of our overall funding from the Home Office.”

He added: “For our part, in serving the public as effectively as possible we recognise that we have to make the best use of the staff and resources available to us. We will continue to work hard with the Force to ensure we can make as much progress as possible, so that with other services we can make a positive difference to those who need us.”

Deputy Chief Constable Ian Pilling said: “The report reflects the challenges of policing in Greater Manchester where we have lost 2,000 officers, which is a reduction of 25%, whilst still receiving more than 3,000 calls for assistance each day.

“Our work has become even more complex with officers dealing with increased reports of domestic abuse, cyber-crime, fraud and child sexual exploitation.  We know that these crimes take much longer to deal with properly than crimes such as burglary, robbery and car crime which we still deal with.

“Managing this demand with reduced resources is extremely difficult and it is a challenge every day to allocate resources to incidents. Unfortunately, as the report highlights, this means that we sometimes don’t deal with incidents as quickly as we would like to.”

Greater Manchester Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime, Bev Hughes, commented: “It is disappointing that GMP have been found to ‘require improvement’; the force is facing ever-increasing pressure to meet demand, as is made clear throughout the report.

“Every victim of crime should receive an effective service. This is also vital if the public are to have confidence in our police service and we know steps need to be made to make sure vulnerable victims are not being put at risk.

“I will be working with the Chief Constable to ensure the concerns raised by HMCIFRS are addressed. We cannot, however, ignore the impact of Government cuts on a police service that has lost more than 2,000 police officers and 1,000 staff and PCSOs.

“I will continue to work with GMP to improve the service, but the Government needs to take on board the findings of this report and realise the impact of their failure to fairly fund policing.”