Headline Performance Report 7 months to October 2009

Report: 5
Date: 3 December 2009
By: Deputy Commissioner on behalf of the Commissioner

Summary

This report provides an overview of progress against targets set for Critical Performance Areas and other corporate measures featured in the Policing London Business Plan 2009–12.

A. Recommendation

That members note the latest performance against the Policing Plan and the MPS’s activity underway to improve outcomes.

B. Supporting information

1. This report provides an update on progress against our key areas of performance. The MPA/MPS Policing London Business Plan 2009-12 highlights how we will deliver the two key outcomes of safety and public confidence (along with ensuring that we do so efficiently and with a clear focus on improvement). Our Policing Plan, underpinned by the 5Ps, has been developed to sustain the crime reduction that has been achieved over the last ten years and, at the same time, increase public trust and confidence in the MPS.

2. Our aim is to focus discussion on areas we are looking to improve. The following paragraphs report performance by exception against those indicators where there is greatest need for action.

Report structure

3. The report comprises two main sections:

• 'Critical Performance Areas' (CPAs) - the corporate ‘critical few’ measures highlighted in the Policing Plan (Appendix 1).
• Other Corporate Policing Plan Indicators – all non-CPA corporate measures featured in the Policing Plan (Appendix 2).

4. As enough of the financial year has passed to make 2009/10 performance against targets meaningful, this report provides data for the financial year to date (FYTD) from April 2009 to October 2009 compared to the same seven months of last year unless otherwise stated. Performance against the 2009/10 targets is assessed using a red, amber or green traffic light.

• ‘Green’ status indicates performance on or above target.
• ‘Amber’ status indicates performance marginally below target.
• ‘Red’ status indicates exceptions where performance is well below target and appears at risk unless remedial action is taken.

Current performance focus

Confidence in local policing

5. This indicator is derived from the Home Office’s British Crime Survey (BCS) of the public and gives “% of people who agree that the police and local council are dealing with anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter in their area”. It is the only indicator for which the Home Office has set targets for police forces.

6. This indicator is shown as amber because the 50.9% performance for the 12 months to June 2009 is below the MPS target for 2009/10 of 51.4%. However that represents a noteworthy increase of 1.6% pts on the 49.3% confidence rate for the year to March 2009. Furthermore it is 3.5% pts above the 47.4% for the twelve months to Sept 2008 which is baseline period for the 55.4% Home Office target for the 12 months to March 2011.

User Satisfaction

7. Satisfaction with the overall service provided by the police is at 77.3% for the FYTD (6 months to September 2009), against a target to improve satisfaction to 80% (using MPS User Satisfaction Survey). The results for this indicator have been largely unchanged over the last 4 quarters - with performance between 78.2% and 77.2%. Performance would have to average somewhere in the region of almost 83% for the remainder of the year to achieve the target.

8. The service area most strongly associated with overall user satisfaction is police actions, which includes the time taken to respond to incidents. Thus the improvements in response times achieved by the Three Borough Project (Brent, Barnet & Harrow) are expected to have a positive impact on user satisfaction. The Project further reduced the average response time for Immediate (I) calls to 10 minutes in October from 11 minutes in the previous month and 12 minutes before the Project began. Significant (S) calls response times have also reduced to an average of 40 minutes compared with 89 minutes prior to the pilot. Part of the pilot is an appointments system for members of the public. From August ’09 to October more than 1,400 appointments were made at the three boroughs. The pilot has now been extended to Hackney, Haringey and Enfield. Early results show a 5% improvement in I response times and an 11% increase in S response times. The pilot will be extended to Southwark and Lewisham at the end of November.

Comparison of satisfaction of white and BME victims with respect to overall service

9. The satisfaction gap between white and BME victims of crime now stands at 5.4% pts for the 2009/10 FYTD to September 2009, against a target of 3.8% pts. The gap for quarter 2 (July-Sept’09) of 4.1% pts improved by 2.5%pts from 6.6% pts for the previous quarter to June 2009 and is not far off the 2009/10 target of 3.8% pts. The national average is 5.5% pts (12 months to June ’09).

Most serious violence (MSV)

10. MSV has increased by 50 offences (0.7%). This means that MSV offences for the next 5 months need to average 812 a month to achieve the 2009/10 annual target of a 4.3% reduction. On average there have been 1,012 offences/month. Although the last 2 months have averaged 887, that improvement may be partly due to seasonality. The combined measure of MSV and Assault with Injury (AWI) has increased by 1.4% over the same period. It shows the same trend as MSV above, with the average for September & October 10% below the average for the previous 5 months (5,755 vs. 6, 382)

11. Homicides, a component of MSV, have declined by 29 offences (30%) over the seventh month period. There have been 18 (35%) fewer homicides involving sharp instruments FYTD with the number of young (aged 10-19) homicide victims from sharp instruments declining from 13 to 4. Young victims as a whole have reduced by 12, from 17 to 5.

12. There have been 143 fewer serious youth violence victims (3.5%) over this FYTD hitting its 4.7% reduction target.

13. Knife crime is showing a decrease of 305 offences/4.0% but that is less than the target reduction of 5.6%. Action under Operation Blunt 2 against knife crime is continuing. Phase 5 consisted of enforcement activity to address the mid-autumn threat from street-based gangs engaged in violence and covered the half term period and before as well as Halloween and the bonfire celebrations. Phase 6 of Blunt 2 will cover the period leading up to Christmas and the reopening of schools in early January.

Serious Acquisitive Crime

14. Serious acquisitive crime (residential burglary, robbery and motor vehicle crime) is down 2.0%, which is meeting the 2% reduction target. This reduction, however, masks 3,229 more residential burglaries (10.2%).

15. Hillingdon has been the first borough to have an Operation BumbleBee focused approach to combating burglary. In the seven weeks leading up to 18 October two people a week were arrested for burglary in the borough. In the first three weeks under BumbleBee the burglary arrest totals went from three to seven to eleven indicating steady progress in catching burglars. There have been a total of 146 BumbleBee related arrests including ones for robbery, drugs and public order. 61 of those arrested have been charged, with a further 39 still under investigation on police bail.

The table below illustrates that while the FYTD figure is high, it is lower than the residential burglary rate of previous years. A negative change rate in the table indicates that the burglaries that year were higher than those in 09/10 - e.g. 09/10 had 11.8% fewer burglaries than 03/04.

Residential burglaries:

• 09/10 vs. 08/09: 10.2%
• 09/10 vs. 07/08: 5.8%
• 09/10 vs. 06/07: 5.1%
• 09/10 vs. 05/06: -3.6%
• 09/10 vs. 04/05: -1.5%
• 09/10 vs. 03/04: -11.8%

The 34,757 residential burglaries for the FYTD 09/10 are just above the average for the FYTD for the last seven years.

16. Motor vehicle crime remains on a downward trend (- 9.1%) and is at its lowest level for a similar 7 month period since at least 1998/99. Robbery rose by 400 offences (2.1%). As mentioned previously much of that increase took place in May which had 274 more offences more than the previous May. Otherwise the trend this year is similar to that of last year.

Serious sexual offences sanction detection rate

17. The sanction detection rate (SD) for serious sexual offences is 23.0%, against a target of 31% for 2009/10. The September meeting requested information on the conviction rate for serious sexual offences. The best available proxy is The Offences Brought To Justice (OBTJ) rate because there are very few OBTJs for this crime type that do not result in convictions. The latest available Home Office’s data shows the OBTJ rate for serious sexual offences for the year to June 2009 is 24.9%. The MPS is fourth in its Home Office MSF group.

18. Recorded rape is at its highest total since at least 1998, with October and September having the highest monthly totals. This could be seen as a positive response by victims coming forward to report what is a very under-reported area of crime. The rise is believed to be linked to the high level of publicity this year about rape court cases, the Government review led by Baroness Stern and the appointment of a Victim’s Champion. All these factors are likely to have contributed to a raised awareness about the specialist services offered by the MPS and Havens to victims of serious sexual crime. The partnership between the MPS and the Havens, where victims of sexual assault are referred for forensic examination, medical care and support, received a Partnership Award at the October 2009 National Justice Awards.

19. The new SCD2 Sapphire OCU took over serious sexual assault investigations in September 2009. Since April 2009, there have been improvements made to the consistency of the recording of serious sexual offences. A new small team reviews all crime classifications in this complex area, where this was previously done by the 32 boroughs. These improvements are also likely to have contributed to the rise of just under 25% in recorded rapes for 2009/10 FYTD.

220. An impact of the enhanced recording of crimes is that there may be a reduction in the % of crimes detected this year. We are working closely with the CPS to ensure that the most appropriate decisions are made in a timely fashion about cases where the evidence supports progression through the criminal justice system.

Police officer recruits from minority ethnic groups

21. The proportion of BME recruits is 14.0%, against a challenging target of 20% as part of the MPS’s goal to raise the percentage of officers from a BME background to 10%.

23 As stated in last month’s report, it has become apparent that the current economic climate was reducing police officer turnover, with 18% fewer police officers leaving the service than originally forecast. Consequently, a decision was made to reduce recruitment targets by 400 to ensure that the MPS remained within establishment. The strategic impact of reduced attrition is:

• Restriction on the ability to improve the diversity of police officers
• Retention of experienced and skilled police officers

24. 180 BME police recruits joined the MPS during the 7 months to October 2009.

25. BME police officer strength has increased from 2,864 at the end of March 2008 to 3,031 at the end of October 2009, an increase of 167 officers. This represents 9.1% of the total police officer strength of 33,318 as compared to 8.8% at the end of March 2009.

226. The October Performance Board undertook a ‘Deep-Dive’ review. The assessment for the second half of this performance year is that BME representation on intakes will reach 25.4%. This will push up the overall performance to 16.6% for 2009/10. This is an improvement upon last year’s 16.2%.

Gun crime

27. For the year to date there has been a 16.8% increase (290 offences) in reported gun crime. Within this overall rise, there have been 120 more Trident gun crime offences/118%. A report on Trident and other shootings went to last month’s SOPC meeting.

28. Gun crime is up by 16.8% (290) offences under the current definition of gun crime which was introduced by the Home Office at the start of 2008/09. In order to compare 2009/10 with pre 2008/09 years, the table below uses a proxy definition of gun crime. The table shows that while gun crime is up by 370 offences on 2008/09, 2009/10 is the 2nd lowest FYTD total for the last 6 years.

Proxy Gun Crime:

• 09/10: 1,563
• 08/09: 1,193
• 07/08: 1,821
• 06/07: 1,816
• 05/06: 2,186
• 04/05: 1,996

Assets recovered

29. The average value of assets recovered April - October 2009 was £3.2m against target monthly average of £3.75m. There is considerable monthly variation - for example October 2009 was half of September 2009 while the range for the FYTD is £1.5M to £5.4M.

30. The Home Secretary turned down the London Criminal Justice Board request for funds to pay for more MPS proceeds of crime (POCA) investigations. Consequently 31 POCA financial investigator posts in TP will be discontinued.

C. Race and equality impact

Implications of performance against individual targets relating to race and equality issues are considered in in-depth performance reports throughout the year. This report notes exceptions in strategic disproportionality indicators where applicable.

D. Financial implications

All costs associated with the activities outlined above are covered within existing budgets.

E. Legal implications

1. There are no direct legal implications arising, as this is a performance monitoring report.

2. The MPA has a duty to secure the maintenance of an efficient and effective police force for its area and a duty to hold the chief officer of police of the force to account for the exercise of his functions and those persons under his direction and control, under s6 of the Police Act 1996.

3. The MPA also have a specific duty to monitor the MPS’s performance against the Policing Plan under s6ZA of the Police Act 1996, as inserted by paragraph 8, Schedule 2 of the Police & Justice Act 2006 and the Police Authorities (Particular Functions & Transitional Provisions) Order 2008.

4. The Committee is the relevant committee to receive the report as its terms of reference set out it is responsible for considering and maintaining police performance against the Policing Plan targets and any performance indicators set locally or by external organisations.

F. Background papers

None

G. Contact details

Report author: Worth Houghton, MPS Strategy and Improvement Department

For information contact:

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

Abbreviations

AWI

Assault with Injury

BCS

British Crime Survey

BME

Black and Minority Ethnic

CPAs

Critical Performance Areas

CPS

Crown Prosecution Service

MPA

Metropolitan Police Authority

MPS

Metropolitan Police Service

MSF

Most Similar Forces - Home Office group of similar forces - MPS, W. Midlands, W, Yorkshire and Greater Manchester

MSV

Most Serious Violence

OBTJ

Offences Brought To Justice

OCU

Operational Command Unit

SAC

Serious Acquisitive Crime

SCD

Specialist Crime Directorate

SD

Sanction Detection Rate

SOP

Strategic and Operational Policing

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