MPA management information report

Report: 06
Date: 24 May 2007
By: Chief Executive

Summary

The MPA management information report gives further detail on the EODB focus item and other equality and diversity information for hate crime, strength, recruitment and MPA staff figures.

For the purposes of this report crime data is given for the full financial year April 2006 to March 2007 compared with April 2005 to March 2006. Police Officer and Staff strength figures are to March 2007. Stop and Search figures are for the rolling 12 months to February 2007.

Safer Neighbourhoods data has been taken from the MPS report “How Equality and Diversity will be delivered through Safer Neighbourhoods” so that all reports are referencing the same data sets. In addition to this the MPS Workforce Data unit produced age profiles of Safer Neighbourhoods police officers and PCSOs to supplement the data already provided to EODB. Details of relevant MPA research have also been included.

A. Recommendations

That

1. Members note the report

B. Supporting information

Summary

1. The report aims to supply committee members with information relevant to equal opportunities and diversity, and highlight any emerging trends.

2. The EODB meeting on 24 May 2007 is focusing on delivering equalities through Safer Neighbourhoods.

3. The main trends to be noted are:

Safer Neighbourhoods

4. Safer Neighbourhoods (SN) teams are now in place on 624 wards across the MPS. There are over 4,000 Police Officers and PCSOs working in SN teams.

5. Female police officers represent 17% and female PCSOs represent 35% of all police officers and PCSOs within SN teams respectively.

6. BME police officers represent 9% and BME PCSOs represent 30% of all police officers and PCSOs within SN teams respectively.

7. Safer Neighbourhoods female police officer representation is at a lower rate than for all police officers. Female police officers represent 20.7% of all officers.

8. Safer Neighbourhoods BME police officer representation is at a higher rate than for all police officers. BME police officers represent 7.9% of all officers.

9. PCSOs are classified as police staff, however due to the distinct operational nature of the PCSO role it may be misleading to directly compare workforce demographics. For the purposes of this report we will compare the diversity of PCSOs with police officers.

10. Safer Neighbourhoods female PCSO representation is at a much higher rate than for all police officers, 35% for PCSOs compared to 20.7% of all police officers.

11. Safer Neighbourhoods BME PCSO representation is at a considerably higher rate than for all police officers, 30% for PCSOs compared to 7.9% of all police officers.

12. The greatest proportion of SN police officers are aged between 30 and 50, where as over half of SN PCSOs are under 30.

13. The MPS report covers the disability and religion strands, but there is no data provided on sexual orientation of SN teams. Provision of this data is optional, although it is hoped that the self-service facility on MetHR (MPS report to EODB 6th April 2006) will provide the MPS with a more accurate picture of the demographics.

14. In December 2006 the MPA Planning and Performance Unit published a research report focusing on diversity of PCSO recruits compared to police officer recruits in the MPS. Although not specifically focused on SN PCSOs, over two-thirds (67.9%) of MPS PCSOs are based within SNTs.

15. The research indicated that over the data period studied (01/04/04 – 31/03/06) there were proportionately more PCSO than police officer recruits in the younger and slightly older age categories, and proportionately more who were from BME communities.

16. During the data period studied in the research the proportion of PCSO leavers from BME communities who left to become police officers was higher than the proportion of BME police officer recruits from the outset. This may suggest that the PCSO role is contributing to diversifying police officer recruitment – however, may also suggest some areas for further analysis into why fewer BME individuals apply/are successful for the police officer role from the outset.

17. The research identified three overarching reasons for more diversity amongst PCSO compared to police officer recruits: the community focused nature of the role; the opportunity the role offers to increase understanding of working for the MPS; and the alternative option that the role provides for unsuccessful police officer applicants.

18. The study highlighted some possible opportunities to retain current PCSOs and further diversify the profile of police officer recruits. These included: providing more opportunities for PCSOs to utilise their skills (e.g. language, practical qualifications, cultural understanding); providing more opportunities for PCSOs to specialise in certain areas; positively promoting and portraying the police officer role (interviews with PCSOs highlighted how it was often the police officer role – rather than the MPS as a whole – that was viewed in negative terms); and clearly communicating MPS policies around issues such as opportunities for non-residential police officer training and how the MPS accommodates cultural practices such as prayer and fasting (some PCSOs interviewed were unaware of changes/new opportunities in these areas and still saw them as barriers for themselves and peers who may be interested in joining the organisation).

19. Full and summary versions of the research are available.

20. The MPA Planning and Performance Unit are currently conducting a short piece of research into how SNTs utilise their Key Individual Network (KIN). Findings to date suggest that KIN members represent a variety of sectors of the community including faith groups, religious figures, women’s support groups, youth leaders, businesses, mental health care centres and residents at a retirement home. An emerging theme from interviews has been the challenges SN teams experience in recruiting young people as KIN members.

Hate Crime

21. Domestic Violence: The volume of domestic violence offences recorded during 2006-07 has decreased by over 5,500 or by 9.4%. Despite the decrease in crime recorded, the sanction detection rate increased by 11.6 percentage points to 39.3%.

22. The proportion of female victims of domestic violence has fallen by 1.1 percentage points to 77.9% when comparing 2006-07 with 2005-06.

23. The proportion of BME victims has remained at a similar rate of 44%.

24. Homicide: There have been 168 homicide crimes recorded for the financial year period between April 2006 and March 2007, 7 fewer than the same 12 months in 2005-06 (includes 13 homicides in July 2005 attributed to the terrorist attacks).

25. 141 homicides have been detected between April and March 2006-07, 18 fewer than for the same period in 2005-06. The financial year detection rate stands at 84%. This is down by 6 percentage points from the previous year (91%). The homicide detection rate target set for 2007-08 is 85%.

26. Rape: The financial year detection rate for rape offences stands at 33.9%. This is a reduction of 2.3 percentage points on the previous 12 months.

27. The financial year sanction detection rate for rape offences is 33.3%, a 2.1 percentage point decrease on the same period last year.

28. The percentage of recorded BME victims of rape has decreased, falling from 33.1% between 2005-06 to 22.6% for 2006-07.

29. The proportion of female rape victims has fallen slightly from 92.9% in 2005-06 to 92.0% in 2006-07.

30. Racist Crime: The number of racist offences recorded in the latest financial year period has fallen by 11.9% or 1346 crimes.

31. The proportion of female victims of racist crime has stayed at a similar rate. The current proportion for 2006-07 is 37.4% compared to 38.2% for 2005-06; where as the proportion of BME victims of racist crime has risen slightly to 72.4% from 71.5%.

32. The current detection rate for racist crime is 37.2%. The sanction detection rate for racist crimes is slightly lower, at 36.9%.

33. Homophobic Crime: There has been an 8.5% decrease in homophobic crimes recorded between April 2006 and March 2007 when comparing with the previous 12 months data. This equates to 110 fewer homophobic crimes recorded. Data for 2006-07 shows the proportion of victims of homophobic crime who are female falling by 1 percentage point to 21.4%.

34. The proportion of homophobic victims who are BME has also remained at a similar rate of 17% year on year.

35. Faith Hate Crime has decreased significantly in the latest 12 months compared to the previous 12 months. There were a large amount of faith hate crimes recorded in July and August 2005, directly relating to the terrorist attacks, that have significantly attributed to the higher levels in 2005. The latest level of faith hate crime is 30.8% or 310 crimes lower than those recorded between April and March 2005-06. There have been 696 faith hate crimes in total recorded by the MPS in 2006-07.

36. There has been a slight increase in the proportion of female victims of faith hate crime with the 2006-07 rate rising by 3.5 percentage points to 36.3%.

37. The proportion of BME victims of faith hate crime has fallen by 2.1 percentage points to 53.9% compared to 56.0% in 2005-06.

Police Officer strength

38. Police officer strength has increased by 0.7% to the end of March 2007, currently at 31,074. The percentage of police officers that are female is 20.7% and 7.9% are from BME communities. Targets set for the 2006-7 financial years for female and BME strength were 20.6% and 8% respectively.

39. The number of police officers at sergeant and above ranks has increased at the same rate as overall police officer strength. Despite the increase, the percentage of male to female officers in this group is disproportional. There are 15.6% female officers at sergeant and above ranks as a proportion of all female officers compared to 28.5% of male officers as a proportion of all male officers.

40. BME officers at sergeant and above ranks as a percentage of all BME officers are 13.9%. This percentage is significantly disproportional to the percentage of non-BME officers at the same rank, which is 26.8% in March 2007.

41. The recruitment drive to increase the strength of female and BME officers will have an impact in time on the number of officers that have reached these higher ranks.

42. At a previous EODB meeting it was requested that a full breakdown of BME officers at all ranks would be useful information for the committee.

There are 2,442 BME officers in the MPS at the end of March 2007. Of those officers, 79% or 1,780 are police constables, 14% or 323 are detective constables, 7% or 166 are sergeants, 3% or 75 are detective sergeants, 2% or 40 are inspectors and 1% or 27 are detective inspectors. There are 10 chief inspectors and 11 detective chief inspectors. There are 6 BME superintendents, 2 BME chief superintendents and 2 BME officers at commander and above rank.

Police staff strength

43. Police staff strength has risen by 1.5% year on year with 13,980 staff at the end of March 2007. The proportion of female staff is higher than male staff at 58.5% and 41.5% respectively; where as 22.9% of police staff is from BME communities.

44. PCSO strength has risen by 60% year on year with the current strength at 3,683. The percentage of female PCSO strength is 34.1%, where as BME PCSO staff makes up 31.3% of total PCSO strength.

Recruitment

45. The number of police officers joining the MPS is relatively low in comparison to strength, with 1,900 officers joining in the 12 months to March 2007. Of those officers joining, 28.3% were female and 12.5% from Black & Minority Ethnic community. Both proportions were higher than the current police officer strength figures.

46. The number of police staff joining the MPS is also relatively low in comparison to strength, with 1,136 staff joining in the 12 months to March 2007. Of those staff joining, 51.5% were female and 25.3% from Black & Minority Ethnic community. The BME proportion is higher than the current strength figures.

47. There has been a much higher intake of PCSOs over the last 12 months compared to the previous year, with 1,728 PCSOs joining compared to 599 in the comparative period. Of those staff joining, 35.7% were female and 23.9% BME.

Retention

48. Retention rates have remained high, with the overall police officer rate of 94.7%. Female officer retention rate is higher than male officers, with rates of 96.2% and 94.3% respectively. The retention rates for BME officers and non-BME officers are 96.2% and 94.5% respectively.

49. Police staff retention rates are slightly lower, but still remain at a high level. The overall police staff retention rate is 93.7% with female and male retention rates of 94.1% and 93.0% respectively. The retention rate for BME staff is 94.3% and non-BME staff 93.5%.

Stop and Search

50. The number of stop & searches recorded in the 12 months to February 2007 has increased by 13.7% year on year. There is currently 43.1 stop & searches per 1,000 residents recorded in London. The number of stop & searches varies by ethnicity groups. 28.2 stop & searches recorded per 1,000 White population, 126.2 per 1,000 Black population and 43.2 per 1,000 Asian population. Stop & searches recorded for all groups show a year on year increase, with the largest for Asian persons, increasing by 22.5%.

51. The proportion of stop & searches of male persons is 95% or 293,533 stops rolling year, with just 14,720 women being stopped & searched over the 12-month period.

52. The total stop and search arrest rate has remained at a similar rate year on year. The arrest rate for White persons is 11.3% with a slightly higher rate for Black persons at 12.4%. The overall 12-month rolling year arrest rate currently stands at 11.5% to February 2007.

MPA equality and diversity data

53. There is currently 102 staff at the MPA, of which 45% are female and 44% are BME.

54. There is currently 58 staff at management grade, of which 40% are female and 29% are BME.

55. The age range of staff at the MPA is between 20 and 64. The smallest proportion of staff are aged between 60 and 64 at just 6.9%, where as the highest proportion of staff is aged between 50 and 59 at 30.4%.

C. Race and equality impact

All equality and diversity information has been incorporated within this report.

D. Financial implications

None

E. Background papers

None

F. Contact details

Report author: Melissa Wagstaff & Gemma Deadman, MPA Planning and Performance Unit, MPA

For more information contact:

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

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