Update on HR Recruitment Community Engagement

Report: 6
Date: 12 November 2009
By: Director of Human Resources on behalf of The Commissioner

Summary

The current report provides members with an update on the HR Community Engagement Strategy, and associated activities concerning apprenticeships, volunteering and work experience.

A. Recommendation

This Committee is invited to note the contents of this report.

B. Supporting information

1. The HR Community Engagement programme started in December 2007 when a series of initial focus groups were held with members of key underrepresented communities. These groups provided information about participant relations with the MPS, perceived barriers to recruitment and the measures needed to help individuals consider a career in the MPS. Since then many members from these communities have joined the MPS.

2. Table 1 presents the number of MPS recruited from priority communities for each role since December 2007 (these groups have been ascertained from ethnicity, country of birth and nationality data).

3. Table 1 reveals that since December 2007, 425 people from target communities have joined the MPS to fill a wide range of roles. These include BME from Pakistani (179), Bangladeshi (96), Turkish (76) and Somali (7). Additionally, 23 people have joined from South Western Asian countries including Azerbaijan, Iran and Iraq.

Table 1 numbers recruited between December 07 and August 09

Source: Workforce Information, 2009

4. Table 1 shows that over 5% of all those recruited are from our target Community Engagement communities. The most popular role has been special constable 145 (10.2%), followed by PCSO 115 (8.4%), police staff 60 (3.9%) and police officer 105 (3.1%). This finding supports evidence gathered during the focus groups regarding trust and confidence and how many roles in the MPS provide opportunity to gain an understanding of the organisation’s culture before taking the bigger step of becoming a police officer.

5. During the same period of time, a total of 1,693 (20.8%) BME personnel have been recruited, including 737 (9.0%) Asian, 401 (4.9%) Black and 308 (3.8%) mixed groups. A total of 536 (15.8%) BME became police officers, 374 (20.7%) BME became PCSO and 452 (31.9%) BME became special constables. There is expectation that around half of all PCSOs recruited will consider becoming police officers in the near future.

6. At end September 2009 the police BME strength has increased to 3,013 (9.0%) officers, including 1,087 (3.3%) Asian and 857 (2.6%) black officers. The Special Constabulary (see below for further details) has the highest BME representation at 32.7%, closely followed by PCSOs at 29.1%.

7. Further details of recruitment and strength numbers can be found in the appendices.

Outreach workers

8. The MPS has the appointed several outreach workers to help us learn more about the Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Somali and Turkish/Kurdish communities in London. The HR community engagement programme has also developed links with organisations that work closely within London’s Black communities (e.g. College of North East London (CONEL, Haringey) and Hackney Community College). Further work is in hand to strengthen the relationships with Black community organisations, including the Local Employment Access Project (LEAP), and the Association of British-Nigerian Law Enforcement Officers (ABLE). These organisations provide targeted employment support to London’s black communities and are keen either to have a relationship with the MPS as an employer or to offer placements.

9. The Somali outreach worker, based in Ealing, works across all of London to maintain interest in the MPS as an employer of choice. He has introduced recruitment to key Somali organisations and supported recruitment events hosted by community organisations. He personally promotes the MPS as an employer of choice. This year sees the recruitment of the first Somali regular constables in the MPS and recruitment into other roles, all of whom have benefited from contact with the outreach worker at various stages of their recruitment.

10. As well as conducting ground breaking outreach work with community organisations, in particular women’s groups, the Turkish-Kurdish outreach worker, based in Haringey, recently introduced recruitment to the Principal of the CONEL. This has led to an agreement in principle to work together in providing ESOL access courses for the local community.

11. The Bengali outreach worker uses his community links in Tower Hamlets to encourage people to attend MPS access courses and recruitment events by reaching out to community organisations and distributing advertising materials. He supports recruitment events at community venues and engages with attendees, promoting the MPS as an employer of choice. As an ex-PCSO he is particularly well placed to describe working for the MPS both in a uniformed and non-uniformed role.

Support

12. Pre-employment courses have been developed in partnership with several colleges in London to provide people - particularly those with literacy, numeracy and language needs - with greater confidence to successfully compete for key roles (e.g. PCSO, designated detention officer and communication officer).

13. Enhanced support sessions have recently been developed with the Central London Training Centre to provide people with specialist guidance on how to approach critical features of the recruitment process (e.g. role-plays during the police assessment centre). This support intervention has been particularly valuable for those who have narrowly missed the MPS pass mark but remain committed to becoming police officers.

14. Support with literacy, language and numeracy skills is now available for PCSOs who wish to become police officers. The scheme, developed in partnership with the five Olympic boroughs, Hackney Community College and HR, provides participants with an opportunity to develop their literacy and numeracy skills to level 1 - 2 (i.e. the standard assessed during the police assessment centre). During the pilot 13 PCSOs successfully completed the scheme and are now applying to become police officers.

Apprenticeships

15. In support of the Mayor’s Skills and Employment Strategy for London 2008-2013 significant work is in progress to expand the number of apprenticeship opportunities in the MPS. The MPS has committed to delivering 150 apprenticeships by end March 2010, with year-on-year targets of 150 apprenticeships thereafter.

16. Within the MPS, the use of apprenticeships to up-skill the existing workforce began some time ago, with 27 individuals progressing through an apprenticeship and a further 26 individuals starting an apprenticeship within 2008/2009 (a total of 53 apprenticeship opportunities offered in 2008/2009). In addition to this number, the MPS Procurement team has been making contact with MPS suppliers to identify apprenticeships offered across our supply chain in 2008/2009.

17. A detailed delivery plan (agreed with the GLA) is in place to ensure that the MPS will meet the target of at least 150 new apprenticeship opportunities. Work currently being progressed includes:

• The enrolment of 100 staff on a range of adult apprenticeship qualifications (Business Admin, Catering, Customer Service) to develop and enhance skills. This work will commence from October 2009.
• Supplier engagement and relationship management to agree apprenticeship delivery plans with each key MPS supplier and provide support for them in accessing public funding and other relevant support. The MPS Procurement team continue to work with the GLA Procurement team to incorporate apprenticeships and wider skills and employment requirements into relevant supply chain contracts.
• Work with the National Apprenticeship Service to explore and access relevant funding streams for delivery of apprenticeship opportunities.
• Collaboration with Skills for Justice and other key London Justice sector partners to introduce an apprenticeship for PCSOs; a generic MPS apprenticeship (to span the Designated Detention Officer, PCSO and Communications Officer roles), and a cross sector Justice apprenticeship, covering the MPS, prisons, courts, Crown Prosecution Service and Probation Services. These opportunities will ensure that the MPS is well positioned to achieve significant apprenticeship numbers in the short-term.

Work Experience

18. The MPS also plays an active role in supporting young people in gaining employability skills through the provision of work experience placements. Since April 2009, 123 work experience placements have been provided across a variety of locations and Business Groups within the MPS, including Central Operations, Specialist Crime, HR and Territorial Policing. In addition to this, the Standard Operating Procedure for responding to and facilitating work experience opportunities across the MPS is currently being reviewed and revised to ensure ongoing good practice in this area, including clear guidance around the requirement for ongoing diversity monitoring.

Volunteering

19. In support of our community engagement strategy, the MPS has launched and embedded a wide range of highly successful volunteering initiatives.

20. Met Volunteer Programme (MVP) – There are currently 1,568 Met volunteers registered with the programme. Of this total, 204 support Safer Neighbourhood Teams and 603 support front counters. Last year, volunteers contributed over 109,000 hours of time (an increase of 9% over the previous year) and we are on target for 113,000 hours for this current financial year. The representation across the MVP is strong, with 69% female; 44% BME, and ages spanning from 18-75+ years. In addition to the skills and employability benefits to the individual, the use of volunteers has brought considerable benefit, both to the MPS and the wider community, with evidence of reduced fear of crime, raised awareness of local issues and increased sharing of local intelligence. Plans are also in progress to ensure the optimal deployment of volunteers to support local boroughs in the lead-up to the Olympics in 2012, with an internal MPS Working Party to be convened from the end of 2009 to consider the requirements of those boroughs that will be hosting events.

21. Metropolitan Special Constabulary (MSC) – Over the last two years, the MPS has demonstrated considerable success in increasing the strength of the MSC from 1,778 officers in 2007 to over 2,600 in 2009. Again, the representation across the MSC is good, with 32% BME and 30% female. The main role of the MSC is to support crime reduction through patrolling, targeting hotspots and providing visibility in town centres and transports hubs. In terms of organisational benefits, the performance results of the MSC speak for themselves, with figures for 2008/09 showing that the MSC carried out 11,299 Stop and Searches (70.4% increase on 2007/08), with 298 leading to arrest (24.7% increase on 2007/08); 4,914 Stop and Accounts (49.7% increase on 2007/08); 2,772 Arrests (51% increase on 2007/08), and 196 Cannabis Warnings (39% increase on 2007/08). Plans and targets are in place to substantially grow the MSC up to the Olympics, with a planned future strength of 6,700 officers (each delivering 300 hours) to be in place by April 2012.

22. Volunteer Police Cadets (VPC) - The VPC range in age from 14-21 years. There are currently 1,423 cadets, providing 56,000 hours of volunteering activity every month across a range of activities, such as crime prevention advice, street audits, test purchase operations and support for training new police recruits. With the support of the MPS, the cadets are given opportunities to learn new skills and receive accredited training. It is our intention to expand the membership of the VPC to 4,000 young people by 2012, with a specific focus on the recruitment of young people who are vulnerable to crime and social exclusion. This is based on a model piloted at Westminster where they began accepting referrals from Youth Offending Teams and other partners five years ago. The unit is now made up of 25% of such referrals with no serving member re-offending. Another encouraging aspect of this model is that many of the young people who have come through the Westminster VPC have, in turn, now become volunteer leaders. The Met Volunteer Programme affords support to the VPC. The VPC also forms part of Project YOU London (Youth Organisation in Uniform), a partnership between a number of uniformed youth organisations in London, and supported by the MPS and the Prince’s Trust. The aim of the project is to deliver more positive activities to young people and a key strand of the work is to encourage more adult volunteers to deliver the activities.

C. Race and equality impact

There are significant diversity benefits to be derived from the delivery of the HR Community Engagement Programme, which progresses the equalities agenda within the important area of recruitment. It provides evidence of how the MPS complies with its legal duty to promote equality of opportunity and good relations between groups.

D. Financial implications

The costs associated with the activities set out above are fully covered within current budgets and financial plans. In terms of the VPC, £400k from the Youth prevention fund has been allocated, to be used as pump priming funding to attract external funding to fully fund the growth to 4,000.The planned increase in MSC numbers will incur additional MPS wide costs. These were set out in the MSC business case as agreed at Management Board and the required growth has been included within the 2010/13 Business Plan.

E. Legal implications

1. This is an information report, therefore there are no direct legal implications arising from the recommendations.

2. Positive action initiatives, engagement with stakeholders and advisory groups, and actively promoting employment opportunities within the police force assist create a more diverse workforce and lead to increased confidence in policing.

F. Background papers

• None

G. Contact details

Report author(s): Duncan Arnold, Strategic Research Manager, HR Recruitment

For information contact:

MPA general: 020 7202 0202
Media enquiries: 020 7202 0217/18

Abbreviations

• ABEL - Association of British-Nigerian Law Enforcement Officers
• BME - Black and Minority Ethnic
• CONEL - College of North East London
• ESOL - English as a Second Language
• GLA - Greater London Authority
• HR - Human Resources
• LEAP - Local Employment Access Project
• MVP - Met Volunteer Programme
• MSC - Metropolitan Special Constabulary
• PCSO - Police Community Support Officers
• VPC - Voluntary Police Cadets

Appendix 1: Strength for each key role at end August 09

Specials

PCSO

Police

Staff

Traffic wardens

Source: Workforce Information, 2009

Send an e-mail linking to this page

Feedback