Headline Performance report for 2010/11

Report: 6
Date: 13 January 2011
By: Deputy Commissioner on behalf of the Commissioner

Summary

This paper describes performance in the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and other corporate measures compared to their 2010/11 targets in the Policing London Business Plan 2010–13 for the eight months to 30 November 2010.

A. Recommendation

That

1. 2010/11 performance in the indicators shown in the Policing Plan against their targets and the MPS’s activity underway to improve outcomes.

B. Supporting information

1. This report provides an overview of how the MPS is performing in the financial year 2010/11 to 30 November 2010 against the targets set for 2010/11 in the MPA/MPS Policing London Business Plan 2010 -13. The Plan’s primary goals are to reduce crime and increase public confidence in the MPS. The comparisons in the report are for the period from April 2010 to November 2010 (“the period”) compared to the same period in 2009/10 unless otherwise stated.

Report structure

2. The body of the report focuses on how the KPIs are performing against targets and against the same period last year. It has 2 appendices:

• KPIs - the corporate ‘key’ measures highlighted in the Policing Plan (Appendix 1).
• Other Corporate Policing Plan Indicators – all non-KPI corporate measures (CMs) featured in the Policing Plan (Appendix 2).

The indicators are graded red, amber or green in Appendix 1 as follows:

Red - performance off target and worse than at the same time last year

Amber - performance off target but better than at the same time last year

Green - performance is on or better than target.

Current performance focus

Summary

3. The trends in this month’s report are similar to those in last month with violent and hate crime at lower levels than last year but with robbery and motor vehicle crime at higher levels. With the exception of motor vehicle crime, performance in all the sanction detection rate KPIs has improved over last year.

4. Physical violence has reduced with violence with injury offences [1] (VWI) almost 2,600 below last year’s level. That decline applies to VWI offences involving knives and guns. We are putting extra focus on the most serious weapons offences - those where a knife has been used to injure and those where a firearm was discharged. That effort is likely to have been instrumental in the 4.3% decline in the former and the 8.4% fewer offences in the latter.

5. The period has seen the number of people who have died in road traffic collisions decline by 28. The number of collisions where someone has been killed or seriously injured (KSI) has fallen by almost 500 (489/14%) for the 12 months to August 2010 compared to the previous 12 months.

6. Increased effort and attention by the boroughs has lead to improvements in recorded hate crime where domestic violence, homophobic crime and racist and religious crime sanction detection (SD) rates are all on target and all having fewer offences than last year.

7. We still face a challenge with robbery which is 5.5% higher than it was last year at this time and especially with knife robbery which is 10.9% higher. Nevertheless robbery this year is at lower levels than for most of the last decade with the third fewest robberies in the last ten years. Personal robbery is up by 7.2% but we have charged 458 more people with this offence - an increase of 17% which demonstrates our increasing effectiveness at bringing these offenders to justice.

8. Business robberies on the other hand are 10% below last year’s level with 217 fewer robberies of this type.

9. In recent weeks, the capital has experienced large scale public protest against education policy and significant police resources have been deployed to police those protests, which continue. For entirely the right reasons, the MPS has been reducing the number of officers deployed on public order events over recent years. Given that every officer policing a public order event is an officer not policing elsewhere in London, this has helped ensure that the MPS is making best use of its resources. Recent events have led the MPS to adopt a more cautionary approach to planning for and policing public protest in London to ensure that the police response is effective. The increased deployment of officers to public order policing is likely to have an impact on the resourcing of pan-London and borough based crime initiatives, and a consequent impact on performance against some KPIs.

10. In addition to the demands of policing the protests themselves, considerable resources have now had to be dedicated to the investigation of crimes and disorder related to those protests.

11. In the submission to MPA Full Authority on 25 November the revenue budget position reflected the best information available on the outcome of the Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR) and on the guidance from the Mayor. The provisional grant settlement announced in December has had an impact on these planning assumptions, reducing the overall resources available including police funding. A revised draft business plan and budget will be submitted to SOP/F&R on 20 January once the impact of the provisional grant settlement has been assessed.

Confidence in local policing - people agreeing police & local council are dealing with local crime & anti-social behaviour (ASB) issues - There is no new information for this KPI - the data is produced quarterly and the next set of data should be available at the end of January.

User Satisfaction & Satisfaction of white & BME users with the overall service provided - As with the previous KPI these indicators are produced quarterly with information expected to be available for the next meeting of this Committee.

Policing Pledge Promises

12. The report on a replacement to the Policing Pledge promises indicator was to go to the Communities, Equalities and People Committee on 3rd December but that meeting was cancelled at the request of the MPA. It is scheduled to be considered by that committee on 6 January.

Serious Acquisitive Crime (SAC)

13. There have been 997 (0.8%) more serious acquisitive crimes (robbery, motor vehicle (MV) crime and residential burglary) vs. the 3.2% reduction target. The increase is due to the rises in robbery and MV crime which are partially offset by the fall in residential burglaries. Nevertheless it is important to bear in mind that although those crime types are higher than last year, they are not high compared to the years before 2009/10. As a result, SAC this year is better than all the years previous to last year going back to at least 1998.

14. The SAC SD rate of 9.6% is below the target of 12.2% and the rate of 10.0% at this time last year. The number of offenders charged has increased by 8.4%. However but the number of crimes Taken Into Consideration at court (TICs) for theft from a motor vehicle is the major reason for that decrease. Those TICs have fallen by 928 and although they provide useful information about offending, unlike charges, they do not represent offenders caught. Moreover TICs vary significantly from year to year. The decline in those TICs is also a major reason why the MV SD rate of 5% is below its 7.5% target.

15. Residential burglaries have fallen by 2,488 / -6.2% offences. That reduction rate achieves the 4% reduction target. The period still has the second fewest residential burglaries for the last 13 years. Although the SD rate of 13.5% is below its target of 16%, it is above the 12% rate at this time last year. More importantly 95 more burglars have been charged even though the number of residential burglaries has declined. The work under Operation Bumblebee is very likely to have played a significant role in that improvement in catching burglars.

16. Robbery continues to be a challenge with 1,193 / 5.5% more offences for this eight month period versus a 3.0 % reduction target for 2010/11. It is important to bear in mind that robbery is still at its third lowest level for the last ten years. The SD rate for robbery of 17.1% is below the 19% target. However it is not only better than last year’s 16.1% but the second best rate for the last 10 years.

17. This rise is the result of the increase in personal robbery by 1,410 (7.2%) offences which has been a cause for concern for most of the year. The items most stolen remain mobile phones and jewellery as mentioned in the last report.

18. We are especially focussed on the rise in knife personal robberies of 480 (11.5%) because of the particular danger they pose to the public. In answer to the rise the MPS has continued with Operation Blunt 2 which focuses on violence and has increased its attention to personal robberies. Among its tactics are the use of unmarked cars to deter and detect robberies in the boroughs with the most robberies and coordinated action on apprehending those wanted for robbery.

19. Autumn Nights, which was originally launched to cover the seasonal upsurge in robbery and violence in early November, has now been extended to the end of the financial year. This is because of funding made available from TfL and 18 boroughs are being assisted with extra resources to be spent on activities such as curfew checks, extra action on outstanding warrants, searches of residences, stop and search as well as maximising the effort to catch outstanding suspects.

20. Safer Transport Command are deploying their crime squads to 10 boroughs where the robbery problem is most acute with the amount of assistance dictated by an assessment based on intelligence of the extent of the problem.

21. The effort the MPS has devoted to tackling personal robbery has resulted in over 450 more people arrested and taken to court for this crime - an increase of 17%. That has meant that the SD rate has improved from 15.0% last year to 16.4% for the period.

22. In spite of the rise in knife personal robberies, those where a knife has been used to injure, which account for a small portion (around 8%) of knife personal robberies, have reduced by 23 or 5%. There has also been a drop in the number of robberies where a gun was involved. They fell by over 250 (259/ 21.7%). Those robberies make up an even smaller proportion (around 4%) of all robberies.

23. Business robberies have fallen by 217 / 10.3% offences. In terms of the weapons involved, those with guns dropped by 106 accounting for almost half the fall in business robberies. Knife business robberies rose slightly by 3.6%.

24. Motor vehicle crime has two components. The first is vehicles stolen which has gone up by 932 / 5.3% this year and so missing the reduction target of 2%. However 2010/11 has the second fewest vehicle thefts since 1998 and is 9% below 2008/09 the next best year.

25. Four vehicle types account for the bulk (780 vehicles) of the increase in stolen vehicles - Mercedes Sprinters, Nisan Micras and Sunnys and Ford Transit vans. The thefts are a particular problem in the North East Area where those models account for 505 more thefts of vehicle for the period this year compared to last year.

26. Consequently as mentioned in the previous report, extra funding has been made available to the boroughs in the east of London that are most affected and proactive operations are planned.

27. The other component of motor vehicle crime is thefts from a motor vehicle. Those thefts have also gone up, with a 2.8% (1,360) increase in the period and consequently falling short of the 3% reduction target. However in spite of that, 2010/11 is still recording the second fewest of these offences since at least 1998.

Homicide

28. There has been 2 fewer homicides during this period and so 2010/11 has had the fewest homicides for the period since at least 1999/00. Homicides due to knives and sharp objects have fallen by 4, those not by knives/sharp objects or firearms have declined by 7 but those due to firearms have risen by 10.

29. 2010/11 has had 16 homicides where the victim was aged 1 to 19 which is six more than last year but on a par with or below the number of young victims in the eight years prior to 2009/10. Preventing homicides especially of teenagers is the cornerstone of the MPS’s anti-knife crime strategy which revolves around Operation Blunt 2 mentioned above. The number of young victims of knife or sharp object homicides for the period is 6 which is the same as last year at this time and significantly less than in 2008/09 when there were 16 homicides of young people.

30. The homicide detection rate for 2010/11 is 93% meeting the target of 85%.

Other Serious Violence

31. In the period violence with injury (VWI) offences have declined by 2,597 offences. The 5.3% reduction for the period means that the 4% reduction target set for most serious violence, a component of VWI, is being achieved.

32. The reduction may be in part due to the initiatives set out above to tackle robbery which may also impact on violence. Previous reports have mentioned other activities to reduce violence such as school visits to highlight the dangers of youth violence and gang involvement; Operation Protect to deal with after schools violence, a website to deter youth offending; and joint anti-weapons campaign by Operations Trident and Blunt 2.

33. The impact of all these measures may have been factors in the falls in VWI for both knife VWI which is 4% below last year’s level with 138 fewer offences and gun VWI where there have been 54 fewer offences - a reduction of 10%.

34. The VWI SD rate is 32.8%. The 2010/11 SD rate is slightly higher than the rates for the previous two years (32% & 32.2%) indicating that the MPS is maintaining its effectiveness in bringing violent offenders before the courts.

Knife crime

35. Knife crimes have increased by 321 / 3.9% which as mentioned above is due to the increase in knife robberies. Because of the MPS’s increased emphasis on risk and harm, it is focussing its monitoring and attention on the more serious knife offences which are those where a knife has been used to injure. There have been 125 / 4.3% fewer of those offences and the activities mentioned above for robbery and VWI have most likely contributed to that encouraging trend.

36. The knife crime SD rate is 25.4% which is an improvement on the rate for the same period in 2009/10 when it was 24.5%. The rate is higher for the knife used to injure offences where it is 32.3% which is also 1.5% points above the rate for those crimes at this time last year. That again demonstrates an improvement in the MPS’s effectiveness at bringing people committing serious offences to justice.

Gun crime

37. Gun crimes have reduced by 374 or 16.2% this year. As with knife crime the focus has shifted from gun crime in general to the gun crime which can lead to the most harm - crimes where a fire arm is discharged. They make up around a quarter of gun crime. There have been 46 or 8.4% fewer of those offences with November having the fewest shootings for a month since December 2009. However it may be a challenge to maintain this level of decrease because the average monthly number of these offences for the period December 2009 to March 2010 was thankfully very low at 44 while the average so far this year has been 63.

38. We believe the reduction is driven by concerted effort and initiatives taken by the MPS to reduce the harm from firearms that have been reported on previously and which are still ongoing. One of those actions is the Operation Trident joint action plans with boroughs around key events or trends such as those identified the Strategic Gun Crime meetings supported by MIB (Met Intelligence Bureau) intelligence. Others are the redoubled effort against firearms supply, maximising the utilisation of forensics, and promoting public reassurance and better understanding around firearms issues through the media. Finally there have been more deployments of armed support units for boroughs particularly as a result of intelligence based taskings through Operation Verano.

39. The 22 deaths from shootings is ten more than 2009/10. In response new plans are being developed to tackle shooting deaths. Operation Trident is investigating 8 shooting deaths for this period compared to 2 last year but there is no evidence that they are linked. The MPS also uses mediation/intervention to reduce gun violence. There is strong evidence that this work has prevented at least one murder and numerous shootings.

40. The SD rate for gun crime as a whole is 29.0% vs. 25.4% last year and 27.1% the year before - the only years where comparable information is available. This year’s performance is indicative of the increasing effectiveness of the MPS’s ability to bring people committing crimes with guns before the courts.

Rape Victims Survey - There is no new data for this survey which is carried out quarterly

41. A comprehensive report on the work of SCD2, the MPS’s unit that deals with serious sexual offences, was presented to the previous meeting of this committee.

42. The report stated that there had been a significant increase in the more serious sexual offences. This is believed to be due to better recording of those offences as a result of the centralisation of the crime management function in SCD2; more reporting by third parties and more victims coming forward.

43. In response to the rise in reported serious sexual offences SCD2 has received more staff. Other improvements to the way rape and other serious sexual offences are dealt with have been:

• a specialist intelligence unit, which has been very effective in locating hard to find suspects;
• a better process for getting feedback from victims on how they are treated by the MPS, with the vast majority being satisfied with the service; and
• the London Rape Charging Centre set up by the Crown Prosecution Service with encouragement from the MPS to bring greater consistency into decision making through specialist legal expertise.

These activities and other MPS action contribute to the work across the criminal justice system to increase rape prosecutions and reduce the attrition rate for rape cases in London.

Reported Hate crimes

44. The three categories of crimes under this heading have continued to decline with decreases of 1,715 / 4.8% in domestic violence (DV), 857 / 12.1% in racist and religious crimes and 73 / 7.1% in homophobic offences.

45. The falls in offences reflect the increased focus the MPS has brought to bear on these crime types as demonstrated by the improvements in their SD rates. Not only are the targets of 47% for DV and 45% for racist and religious crime and homophobic offences being met, but the rates of 48.3% for DV, 47.8% for racist and religious crime and 50.7% for homophobic crime are the best rates achieved by the MPS for the period. This is the result of increased focus by the boroughs as well as better training and monitoring as reported previously. Territorial Policing Headquarters continues to monitor the most serious of these cases to make sure that they get an appropriate response.

46. The DV arrest rate of 80.7% is exceeding the 77% target which indicates that the MPS is being proactive in trying to reduce domestic violence.

People killed or seriously injured (KSI) in road traffic collisions

47. There were 10 proactive operations to bring down the number of KSI victims in November with particular emphasis on cyclists, motorcyclists and drivers of LGVs.

48. The various activities the MPS carries out to make the roads safer for the public are on-going and include safety courses for motorcyclists, joint working with TfL and local authorities to specify sites most in need of work to improve road safety, road safety visits to schools and enforcement action.

49. Enforcement action has improved this year with a monthly average of 361 people disqualified this financial year through October compared to 344 a month for (all of) 2009/10. Nearly all of these disqualifications are at least partially for bad driving or having a dangerous vehicle since a person can not be disqualified for just one document offence e.g. no insurance.

50. This work and that of the MPS’s partners in improving road safety have been instrumental in reducing by 489 (14%) the number of KSI victims in the 12 months to August 2010 compared to the previous 12 months and achieving the 2010/11 target of less than 277 victims a month. In the first eight months of 2010/11 28 fewer people died in traffic collisions than in the same period last year.

51. As in past years, during the month of December the MPS will carry out a campaign to reduce the number of people driving under the influence of drink or drugs through high visibility enforcement action. This is in response to the rise in alcohol consumption in the holiday season that can result in more victims from vehicle collisions on the roads.

Police officer recruits from minority ethnic groups - there is no new data because recruitment has been paused

Olympic and Paralympic Risk Exception Report

52. The report covers the time from 12 November to 10 December. Four risks (availability of funding, inadequate integration with security partners, insufficient resilience to respond to an increased national threat level and inadequate operational integration between Olympics projects and business as usual operations) have been put on the Priority List and one risk - (slow transition to operational readiness) remains. The Olympics Command has taken a number of steps to mitigate these risks including setting up a board which should largely reduce the risk posed by the inadequate integration between Olympic projects and ordinary business. These risks are not all exclusive to the MPS but are shared with the Government and other bodies.

53. Four risks have been removed from the Priority List but are still Portfolio Risks - the next level of risks from the Priority List. They are - inability to recruit and retain appropriate staff, bridging the gap between the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games responsibilities and the available funding, failure to plan for the difference between the Olympics and the Paralympics and risk of restructure due to the new government.

Cashable savings delivered

54. This information is provided quarterly and so there is no update to the information provided in the previous report.

C. Other organisational and community implications

Race and Equality Impact

1. The regular review of the statistics provided enables the MPS to highlight areas for diversity and equality consideration and address them accordingly.

Consideration of MET Forward

2. The KPIs and other corporate measures covered in this report reflect performance against the key outcomes of Met Forward: fighting crime and reducing criminality, increasing confidence in policing, and providing better value for money.

Financial Implications

3. We have reported to previous meetings on the Government’s ‘in year’ reduction in policing grant and the resulting cuts of £28m in general expenditure and £5m in counter terrorism funding Work is ongoing to find ways to deal with this reduced funding which is on top of the £124m deceases that were part of the 2010/11 budget.

4. As mentioned above, the main grants from the Government for 2011/12 and beyond have been announced. We are working through the implications and a revised draft business plan and budget will be submitted to SOP/F&R on 20 January. However the precept and funding from local authorities and TfL and other bodies for enhanced police services will not be clear for some time; and so the impact of the budget reduction set out in the Comprehensive Spending Review may remain incomplete until later in the financial year.

5. As mentioned above, the final impact on the MPS budget will clearly be challenging, given the efficiencies already built into the Service’s budget. The Service will work with the Authority in developing the 2011-14 Budget and Business Plan against these challenging financial constraints.

6. The revenue monitoring position for 2010/11 at Period 7 (to the end of October) is a forecast overspend of £1.7m (0.1% of budget). Management Board is actively identifying options for reducing forecast expenditure in order to manage this position.

7. The Capital Programme as at Period 7 (to the end of October) shows year to date total expenditure of £88.8m. This total represents 32.1% of the revised annual budget of £276.3m. The forecast for the year of £250.8m represents an underspend of £25.5m (9.2% of the revised annual budget).

8. The costs associated with monitoring and presenting the data set out above are all covered within existing service wide budgets as approved within the 2010/13 Business Plan.

Legal Implications

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

10. 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.

11. 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.

12. The Strategic Operational 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.

Environmental Implications

13. This report contains no direct environmental implications. The MPS has included an indicator relating to the percentage change in total tonnes of CO2 emissions (from buildings, vehicles, operational air travel) which is reported annually within Appendix 2.

Risk Implications

14. Risks and opportunities identified in related to performance against the KPIs are reflected in the content of this report.

D. Background papers

None

D. Contact details

Report author: Worth Houghton, MPS Strategy and Improvement Department, MPS

For information contact:

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

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