Progress in the implementation of Recommendation 61 of the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry

Report: 08a
Date: 16 October 2003
By: Commissioner

Summary

Recommendation 61 of the Stephen Lawrence inquiry seeks to establish a system whereby a record is made by police officers of all stops and stop & searches. This report outlines the progress made towards implementation within the Metropolitan Police Service since the last report in July 2003.

A. Recommendations

The Board is asked note the contents of this report

B. Supporting information

Overview

1. Recommendation 61 of the Stephen Lawrence report stated, ”That the Home Secretary, in consultation with police services, should ensure that a record is made by police officers of all “stops” and “stop and searches” made under any legislative provision. Non-statutory or so-called “voluntary” stops must also be recorded. The record to include the reason for the stop, the outcome, and the self-defined ethnic identity of the person stopped. A copy of the record shall be given to the person stopped”.

2. Home Office has decided that there will be phased implementation of recommendation 61 across England and Wales. The intention of the Home Office is to reflect different policing environments and resident population profile. In the MPS the first phase of implementation of Recommendation 61 commenced in Hackney borough on 1 April 2003. The recording of self-defined ethnicity (16+1) commenced across the MPS on 1 April 2003. The implementation is well under way in Hackney.

3. As part of the phased implementation of Recommendation 61, Tower Hamlets borough has been identified as the next site. The implementation is scheduled to commence at Tower Hamlets by end of November 2003.

4. An interim evaluation by the Home Office into the implementation of Recommendation 61 of the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry shows the MPS in a good light. The figures below show the stop and stop/search activity of the five forces involved for the first quarter of 2003.

5. Whilst it is difficult to make direct comparisons without knowing details of the other four sites, it is clear that Hackney officers are actively engaged in the implementation. Stops in Hackney are running at a monthly average of 350 on top of a monthly average of searches of 800. Hackney has the highest overall interaction in terms of stops and stop/searches of all of the Home Office implementation sites.

Training

6. Internal Consultancy Group (ICG) carried out the evaluation of the effectiveness of the training. MPS also carried out a separate review on the delivery of the training for Recommendation 61. The Training Policy Unit carried out this review. This review evaluated the research carried out prior to the designing of the course, delivery of the training, student reaction and learning. During the evaluation by ICG some officers raised concern that they were not clear about the definition of ‘stop’. At Hackney 95% of the frontline and operational officers, Station Reception Officers and Communications staff have been trained Hackney borough has a Frequently Asked Questions site on the INTRANET where this issue is addressed. The local training unit trains new staff arrivals at the borough. The staff are encouraged to ask their supervisors for any clarification if they are unsure. Home Office research has shown that Hackney officers have a good understanding of the term “stop”. Lessons learned from these reviews have been taken into account whilst designing the training to Tower Hamlets Officers.

7. Work is progressing to implement Recommendation 61 across the MPS. Lessons learned from Hackney and Tower Hamlets will be used to fine-tune the training for the rest of the MPS staff. MPS is confident that Recommendation 61 will be implemented across the MPS before April 2005.

Information Technology

8. The Deputy Commissioner has agreed to introduce a hand-held IT solution at Tower Hamlets as part of this phased implementation of Recommendation 61 by end of November 2003. The trial at Tower Hamlets will involve 75 hand-held machines to record stops and stop and searches. This will form part of a “Proof-of-concept” project. The hand held machine capability at Tower Hamlets will encompass PNC access, SMS-type messaging and Stop and Search records, including printing. It will demonstrate the fitness for purpose of the devices and the fact that MPS can deliver mobile data via commercial carriers such as Orange and Vodaphone.

9. Supt Nigel Brown of Territorial Policing is leading the project to introduce hand held device to record stops and stop and searches. Suppliers for the hardware and software have been identified and software has been written for the project. However, a solution to fully integrate with existing MPS IT systems needs to be established. We are on schedule to start using IT to record stops on 30 November 2003, within the caveat, agreed by the Recommendation 61 Steering group, that the MPS would only commence if the technology was fully fit for purpose.

10. This Stop and Search IT solution being developed is tailored to specific MPS requirements and builds upon the significant investment MPS has made over the past 12 months in improving the whole process of IT support for Stop and Search.

11. This is a proof-of-concept. There are a whole plethora of issues that the exercise will help tease out, some of which, for example the practical of use of the devices in terms of Health and Safety, supervision and security will help to determine how this is progressed further.

12. Training of the users at Tower Hamlets is being co-ordinated by the user representatives on the project team. Issues on contention and abstractions are being managed locally.

13. Any decision to rollout mobile data MPS wide will have to be co-ordinated with the C3i implementation in order to manage abstractions. There will be no adverse affect on C3i. Mobile capability will indeed compliment the C3i process and that of Modernising Operations.

Communication

14. The MPS now has taken the lead from the MPA on external communication for Recommendation 61 in Hackney borough. Directorate of Public Affairs (DPA) assisted Hackney borough in this field and produced posters to publicise and inform this activity. However following suggestions from the MPA to improve the product, work is underway to amend the posters taking in suggestions from all parties. Chief Inspector Smith from Hackney borough has also attended MPA led community meeting and provided information about the progress of Recommendation 61. He also presented details of stop and stop and search activity carried out at Hackney borough, this included depersonalised details of most stopped persons in the borough and also details of work carried out by 2 officers. Tower Hamlets will use the same communication strategy to inform its residents.

Forms

15. The new Stop and Search forms were introduced across the MPS on 1 April 2003. The forms have been designed to meet the requirements of the new code of practice ‘A’ relating to stop and search as well as to record stops under Recommendation 61.

16. The changes to Code ‘A’ were brought about to improve trust and confidence of the community in the police service, one of the main changes is for the officers to complete the record of the search at the time of the search and provide a copy of the record at that time to the person concerned. Since the introduction of the new form research indicates that only 70% of the people are waiting to receive a copy of the search record. As a number of people have raised concern over the design of the form, MPS commissioned Internal Consultancy Group (ICG) to carry out an evaluation of this form.

17. ICG have completed the review of the form, the report indicates that the new form takes anything from 5-30 minutes to complete. Some of the Stop and Search interactions are resented by the person searched, if the person has to wait to collect the form the resentment is increased with any increase in the length of the interaction. The officers have also complained about the form’s shape and design even though the form is of the same shape and size as the FPNs.

18. The section of the form that caused the greatest concern was the “grounds for search”. The officers pointed out at the difficulty in accurately completing this section of the form in pressurised environment. This is also the section that takes the longest time to complete. However the Codes of Practice require “the record of the grounds for making the search must briefly but informatively, explain the reasons for suspecting the person concerned by reference to person’s behaviour and/or other circumstances”. One of the options being considered for the revised form is to have a menu of options for the grounds rather than free text. This would speed up the process of completing the form. The hand held IT device would have a drop down options to record the grounds.

19. Most of the information recorded on the form is a statutory requirement. The MPS form has been enlarged to accommodate a greater descriptive element and officers almost universally welcome this. Commander Broadhurst has circulated the report by ICG amongst the Stop and Search workgroup. This will lead to a team, comprising of all stakeholders including members from Diversity Directorate, Territorial Policing, MPA and practitioners, being formed (after receiving the feedback and suggestions from the workgroup) to redesign the stop and search form in order to minimise the length of time it takes to complete the form whilst ensuring the details required by Codes of Practice are completed for each encounter.

20. Police Officers have also identified the need to expand the number of groups on the list for self-defined ethnicity, as London is a diverse city, there are a large groups of people who are not represented in the census 2001 list. For example people of Kurdish, Turkish, Arabic, Somalian, Kosovan and Gypsy origin are just a few of the groups who have asked why they are not represented on the list. A number of people have also said they just want to self-define themselves as Black British and do not want to further identify themselves as African or Caribbean. We are still waiting further guidance from the Home Office to expand the list of 16 categories. It may be possible locally for the officers to record free text the self-defined ethnicity of the person, however when the data is sent to the Home Office the police will have to decide into which of the 16 categories the data should be aggregated. The Home Office will only accept data in the 16 categories in order to analyse it against the 16 categories in the census 2001.

Evaluation

21. Recommendation 61 has been operating at Hackney for 6 months now. Recommendation 61 Steering group will meet on 13 October to evaluate the implementation. It will discuss all the information available, what lessons have been learnt so far. All the stakeholder’s views will be taken to decide what MPS needs to do to implement Recommendation 61 across the MPS.

C. Equality and diversity implications

Recommendation 61 is a key element to achieve Recommendation 1 of Stephen Lawrence report that is to increase trust and confidence in policing amongst minority ethnic communities. Recommendation 61 will provide the opportunity for the person stopped to self-define their ethnic identity according to the classification in census 2001. This will assist the MPS to monitor the treatment of different ethnic groups in order to improve the service we provide and improve the trust and confidence of the public in the police service.

D. Financial implications

1. The cost of the whole proof-of-concept project is around £500,000. This includes hardware, software development and network capacity. This is being met from existing budgets.

2. The full financial implications of any IT solution will be an output of the proof-of-concept project. The provision and maintenance of thousands of devices and the costs associated with the development of "industrial strength" software and mobile network capacity will not be insignificant. Initially the proof-of-concept will only record stop/searches and PNC. The MPS aim will be to include crime reports at a later stage with a view to utilising the airwave service as the carrier.

E. Background papers

None

F. Contact details

Report author: Inspector Manpreet Bains, Diversity Directorate, MPS.

For more information contact:

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

Send an e-mail linking to this page

Feedback