Olympic and paralympic games update

Report: 10
Date: 3 April 2008
By: Assistant Commissioner Central Operations on behalf of the Commissioner

Summary

This report summarises how the MPS intends to ensure that diversity and citizen focus is an integrated part of the Olympic Security Programme (OSP) and outlines some of the activity in that has already taken place.

A. Recommendations

That members note and support the MPS approach to delivering diversity and equal opportunities within the Olympic Security Programme.

B. Supporting information

1. On 8 March 2007, the MPS submitted a report to the Equality Opportunities and Diversity Board. The report covered the following areas:

• the Olympic Security Directorate (OSD) security programme and Vision
• Equality Impact Assessments (EIA)
• Youth
• Disability
• Gender
• Delivery
• Volunteers
• Languages and Interpreting
• Leadership
• Staff Involved in the Planning
• Profile of CO12 / OSD Staff
• Performance Regime

Olympic Security Directorate (OSD) Security Programme and Vision

2. The original Security Coordinator’s Security Strategy written in September 2007 is now in its second draft of development, and it lays out the key requirements and outcomes needed to ensure a secure, safe and resilient Olympic Games. Leading up to the development of the Strategy, the Olympic Security Programme’s structure was reviewed to ensure that it was fully aligned to the Strategy.

3. The original 15 workstreams were reduced to six, shown below, because of programme management principles being adopted through the introduction of a dedicated programme team; more rigorous financial scrutiny processes; in addition to more extensive internal / external consultation presentations and processes:

• Secure Environment (Physical & People) - To provide a secure environment in terms of venues and events
• Operational Planning and Consequence Management - Intelligence led planning, command and control, and delivery of operational security and contingencies for a safe, secure and resilient London 2012 Games and managing the impact of the Games on the delivery of OSD member core functions and activities
• Specialist and Human Resources - Coordinating OSD Members to identify and equip themselves with the skills, volume and specialist resources to ensure delivery of a safe, secure and resilient London 2012 Games
• Information Technology and Communications - Provision of a safe, secure & resilient information, technology and communications for the London 2012 Games
• Community Engagement - Engaging and fully involving the public in working towards the delivery of a safe, secure and resilient London 2012 Games
• CONTEST - To ensure the provision of appropriate counter terrorism and allied security/protection measures in line with HM Government Counter Terrorism Strategy

4. The workstreams are aligned to the following strategic objectives:

• To deliver effective and proportionate security for the London 2012 Games and associated national events
• To provide a full state of operational readiness during the London 2012 Games and associated national events
• To ensure fully joined up governance in relation to the security approach for the London 2012 Games and associated national events
• To ensure there is community confidence, reassurance and satisfaction with the security approach for the London 2012 Games and associated national events

OSD / CO12 Staff

5. The OSD currently employees a total of 79 personnel of which:

• 41 are police officers and 38 police staff
• 49% of the police staff and 7.5% of Police Officers are female
• The percentage of Black Minority Ethnic (BME) members of the 79 OSD staff is 11.4%
• Senior positions (Supt / Band B and above) 11% are women and 11% are BME
• Steps are being taken to record staff make up according to age bands
• It is not mandatory to collect sexual orientation and faith / belief data; however, future work will look at ways of obtaining this information.

6. Recruitment to the OSD has been primarily internal, however, where appropriate to obtain specific technical skills external recruitment processes have been used. Recruitment processes have complied with current MPS policy, which is committed to providing London with a fully representative police service; for example in the recruitment of the Information Communications and Technology Workstream Manager.

7. As part of the OSD commitment to mainstreaming diversity and equalities issues a member of the Community Engagement Team (CET) has a Diversity Champion, to ensure OSD comply with all corporate equality schemes by maintaining close links with DCFD and utilising their expertise through their tasking process. This officer was one of the two DCFD officers transferred to the CET in January 2008 to show the commitment and determination of the OSD to ensure equality and diversity issues are fully integrated into the OSP.

8. The CET has led the Equality and Diversity Action Plan process and has identified objectives for the coming year to ensure greater ethnic representation of the workforce within the OSD and the figures above sets out the basis from which to work from.

9. A scoping exercise has been carried out by the CET to identify learning opportunities within the diversity arena. Bespoke Equality Impact Assessment management has been devised and delivered to all appropriate staff within the OSD; this is being rolled out to the organisational leads for OSD strategic partners and further details are highlighted in paragraph 21.

Community Engagement Team

10. This time last year there was no workstream looking at active community engagement and participation. It was after a number of internal / external presentations and consultation processes, in addition to the appointment of a Programme Manager and a team that it became apparent the community satisfaction, reassurance and participation in the security effort would not be dealt with effectively without a workstream and a dedicated team in this area of work. This led to the formation of the CET in November ’07 and the developing Community Engagement workstream.

11. The CET currently consists of a Superintendent and two former DCFD staff (1 Inspector and 1 PC), who were selected for their specialist knowledge and experience in this area of work; additionally, the Metropolitan Volunteer Programme (MVP) is co-ordinated by a member of police staff who is also part of the CET. All members of the CET are working towards achieving the end state of active community engagement and participation for the Olympic and Paralympics games. A proposal is under consideration for a member of the CET to be temporarily seconded to the London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (LOCOG), to ensure closer partnership work leading up to and during the Games; notwithstanding the ongoing legacy work.

12. To achieve this end state, the CET together with other OSD members and the CO Diversity Advisor has drawn up the following Decisive Conditions (DC’s):

• Effective community reassurance
• Active community participation in the safety and security effort
• Active business participation in the safety and security effort
• Effective crime prevention
• Effective strategies for safeguarding communities

The CET is in the process of co-ordinating these DCs through enabler projects known as Supporting Effects (SEs) since the beginning of the year. At present the CET is in the process of developing business packages for each of the SEs, consequently there are no significant examples of outcomes to highlight at this stage. Within programme management principles, the majority of work carried out by the CET is in the programme planning phase and the delivery phase will develop significantly once the business packages are agreed.

Delivery

13. The CET has convened a National Strategic Community Engagement Board (NSCEB); made up of the Home Office, LOCOG, ODA, DCLG, DCMS, GLA, LDA, LGA and other members of the OSD multi-agency group, to ensure continuity in engagement activities and to make decisions on potential OSD-driven community engagement events; in addition to consultation exercises within the developing National Community Engagement Strategy.

14. The various diversity strands [race, age, faith / belief, disability, sexual orientation and gender] and the cultural needs of the community will be addressed through every stage of the planning and delivery phases of the programme through a clearly defined and deliverable programme plan. It is anticipated that the CET will utilise the expertise of the DCFD Advisors, however, the specific details have not been agreed through the tasking process at this stage.

15. The CET has developed a forum that draws together the nine wards on the five Olympic boroughs that meet on a regular basis. The forum’s key terms of reference are to ensure that timely and appropriate updates and consultation opportunities to maintain strong and consistent links with the Safer Neighbourhood Team (SNT) managers.

16. One key piece of work that has stemmed from this forum is a Community Cohesion Project. This project aims to identify patterns of crime and tension that could appear within London’s communities, then to implement measures to either remove or reduce the impact of such events occurring and bring those issues to the attention of all relevant agencies.

17. The CET visits the SNT across the host boroughs that will be working in conjunction with the Olympic village and surrounding developments. It gathers community knowledge and potential concerns from officers who are dealing with the communities directly.

18. All five Olympic boroughs have fully functioning strategic 2012 Gold Groups on the advice of the CET. These groups, with the continuing support of the CET, identify affected areas in the Boroughs and utilise key partners to address issues that are affected by Olympic specific activity. This interaction on a tactical level has been an effective method of giving the CET an operational interface with local communities. The CET has featured in reassurance activities and problem solving processes on the associated borough responding to Olympic specific critical incidences; for example working with the Hackney Gold Group, in particular the relevant ward SNT involved in the high profile fire on the site in November 2007 and subsequent reassurance strategy.

19. With the information received from the Gold Groups to the OSD based NIM compliant Intelligence Unit, the OSD and the wider MPS will have a better understanding of new communities moving to host boroughs. By building a local evidence base the CET can:

• guide borough police teams and SNTs
• raise awareness of potential issues and tensions
• equip SNTs with knowledge to assist with bringing reassurance of new and existing communities
• provide a heightened awareness of potentially vulnerable communities and significant demographic changes, especially those issues relating to the growing workforce on the Olympic site.

Equality Impact Assessments (EIA)

20. A bespoke EIA was completed by the CET in relation to the initial 15 strands and consultation took place internally with DCFD experts. This is being followed up with EIAs for external partners through an operational subgroup of the NSCEB that is being developed. It will focus on corporate and local policies, corporate change, projects, strategic decisions, procedures, functions, strategies, pre-planned operations, policing plans and equality schemes.

21. The CET devised a stepped approach to consultation. This was in the form of three main strategic phases.

• Primarily the first phase encapsulated the skills and expertise of the DCFD and Staff Support Associations. The Team initially assessed all the original project proposals and in conjunction with DCFD colleagues provisionally consulted.
• Phase two focused on Ward Panel representation whereby the SNT managers would request feedback from their Community Forums as well as selected existing local community forums, such as the Newham Race Equality Alliance.
• The third and existing interactive process is the outward facing and joined up consultation process with key strategic partners, chiefly the London Development Agency (LDA) and the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA).

Feedback indicated that equalities are being appropriately addressed and no significant issues were apparent. There were a number of general points highlighted through consultation, which currently do not noticeably lie with any particular area of business. A meeting is to be arranged with the Workstream Managers to establish which workstream suggestions they relate to.

22. Now that the OSP has been reworked to a programme structure with six delivery workstreams that adheres to programme management principles, the CET are in the process of devising a joint consultation process with the LDA and the ODA as well as existing external focus groups, in addition to independent advisory groups, SNT forums and other borough based community forums.

Racial and Religious Hatred Act

23. The Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006 has been considered and will be continually assessed by an iterative engagement process, in compliance with the MPS 2008-2010 Equalities Scheme. At this time there are no specific indicators of Olympic related critical incidents. The CET has engaged with the Race Independent Advisory Group and has welcomed their input to the NSCEB, and it is anticipated their role will be more prominent in the developing operational subgroup of the NSCEB.

Youth

24. A recent internal OSD scrutiny review has proposed the recruitment of a Youth Initiatives Coordinator during the 08/09 financial year, to divert young people from crime and/or anti-social behaviour.

25. Within the Community Engagement workstream there are activities regarding youth-focused educational plans through Safer Schools Officers and SNTs, to build young people’s self esteem and generate self empowerment.

26. The CET has established strong and consistent local and strategic links with LOCOG and the ODA in order to identify and implement joint employment opportunities for young people. This will be a priority for the CET officer looking at being seconded to LOCOG under a review process that will show value for money.

27. The CET has established a YOT steering group from the Olympic host boroughs. The YOTs coordinate young people who are potentially vulnerable to further criminal activity, into training and employment opportunities through Local Labour Business Schemes. At the moment there is a pilot apprenticeship initiative running in Waltham Forest with one of the Olympic contractors that is showing some very promising signs, however, it is still too early to quantify the full impact on the participants.

28. Both the educational programmes and the employment initiatives will be fully evaluated for their outcomes in changing the life experiences of the participants. Additionally the CET support employment fairs within the host event boroughs that attract hundreds of young people, the results of which are shared with their respective Olympic Gold Groups.

Disability

29. The OSD will be taking every opportunity to engage with disabled communities. During the planning and consultation phases the OSD will ensure that:

• accessibility needs are catered for within its communication methods by adopting different formats in all of its publications
• disabled communities are consulted on operational matters such as searching and evacuation
• infrastructure, e.g. IT and buildings within the OSP are DDA-compliant

30. The CET has fully embraced the support and advice from the MPS Strategic Disability Team, who are within DCFD. Within the Community Engagement workstream there are outcomes that encompass the support of people with disabilities. The CET will seek the opportunities for engaging and consulting with disabled communities, including Disability Independent Advisory groups.

31. The CET will research past as well as observe future Paralympic Games, and similar sporting events, to learn from and benchmark with key agencies involved in these events. In addition to observing the impact these events have had on disabled communities.

32. A new London Resilience Partnership Disability Group has been formed to ensure that disability issues are an integral part of all emergency planning processes. The CET will work with the head of CO3, who is the Deputy Chair of that group, to deliver Disability Impact Assessments for the roll out of the OSP planning process.

Women, children and other vulnerable groups

33. The CET has recently formed links with the United Kingdom Human Trafficking Centre, and will continue to share information and work strategically with the Borders and Immigration Agency, in addition to the GLA lead on these matters in accordance with the Community Engagement workstream.

34. The EIA process will now encapsulate opportunities to address the correct response for dealing with potentially vulnerable groups, in partnership with other MPS business group teams within SCD and TP.

Volunteers

35. The MVP is now underway at the OSD through the MVP Co-ordinator who is part of the CET. Recruitment of office-based volunteers has begun, with the first volunteers starting by March 2008 subject to security vetting. Diversity representation is being ensured by developing relationships with local and pan London community groups and targeting specific hard to hear / reach groups, with an equal opportunities monitoring system put in place to track this process.

36. Once recruited all volunteers undergo a full induction programme into risk assessed roles before they take on their responsibilities. In the first instance volunteer support will assist in areas of IT / Intranet, Communications, Administration, Travel Co-ordination and MVP Co-ordination. Thereafter volunteers will be recruited to support the Olympic Site Support Unit (OSSU).

OSD Specialist and Human Resources

37. It is anticipated that there will be a significant demand for police officers and support staff during 2012. In particular, there will be a demand for officers with specialist policing skills. The issue of multiple skills needs to be considered for officers who may have more than one specialism, which needs to be accounted for in resource planning.

38. The specialist and human resources workstream are presenting an initial MPS skills audit in June 2008. This will be fed into an ACPO-led National Skills Audit to be completed by December 2008. This will enable the OSP to identify any potential gaps in skills, diversity or officer numbers when brought together with the demand work being carried out by the event planning team in the OSD. The views of the CO Diversity lead have been sort to take part in this audit.

39. Part of the audit work to date included multi-agency workshop in January 2008, entitled ‘Closing the Gap for 2012’. This workshop introduced the development of the workstream and promoted discussion across subjects including training and recruitment, incentives and retention and annual and special leave.

40. Communication with MPS policy and human resources experts has been initiated regarding the issues of policy especially around flexible working, possible childcare issues, shift patterns and leave. These issues are built into the planning of the programme to ensure continuing involvement.

41. Central HR business group is currently conducting a review of relevant HR policies to determine their flexibility and how they can be utilised for the Olympic and Paralympic Games. Any temporary changes or amendments will be done in consultation with the relevant bodies; however, no decisions have been made at this time.

42. The demand for numbers and skills to deliver the safety and security of the Games is likely to exceed supply in some areas. The workstream will consider a number of options including rest days and shift patterns in order to ensure optimal demand management. The programme will model the gap between demand and supply and suggest the impacts (both positive and negative) of specific approaches to maximise the use of staff. This work will be a transparent process involving full consultation with Union and Federation representatives. This audit and gap analysis will also inform succession planning for the security of the Games.

Operational Delivery

43. The Olympic Park policing team, now known as the Olympic Site Support Unit (OSSU), was established in July 2007 to work in partnership with and build reassurance in key stakeholders associated with the building and fitting out of the venues. It is the only police and emergency service unit that has unrestricted and unescorted access within the perimeter of the Olympic site. The team is already proving to be invaluable and has been welcomed by all partners, gaining their trust from the outset, and has built up a well deserved reputation. The OSSU has worked closely with the CET and nine local ward SNTs to ensure that the needs of local communities are met and that the opportunities that the Games bring are maximised. The CET leads a regular SNT Forum made up of the 9 SNT wards impacted by the Olympic site, together with OSSU representatives.

44. At a strategic level the CET is a member of the ODA co-ordinated CADRAP (Crime & Disorder Risk Assessment Panel) set up to risk assess and manage the impact of crime and disorder matters occurring within or impacting on the Olympic site.

Abbreviations

ACPO

Association of Chief Police Officers

BCU

Borough Command Unit (Police)

BIA

Her Majesty’s Border and Immigration Agency

BTP

British Transport Police

CET

Community Engagement Team

CO

Central Operations

CONTEST UK

national counter terrorism strategy

DC’s

Decisive Conditions

DCDC

Development, Concepts and Doctrine Centre (MOD)

DCLG

Department for Communities and Local Government

DCMS

Department for Culture, Media and Sport

EIA

Equality Impact Assessment

GLA

Greater London Authority

HMG

Her Majesty’s Government

ICT

Information and Communication Technology

IOC

International Olympic Committee

LAS

London Ambulance Service

LDA

London Development Agency

LFB

London Fire Brigade

LMF

Legacy Management Framework

LOCOG

London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games

MOD

Ministry of Defence

MVP

Metropolitan Police Volunteers Programme

NIM

National Intelligence Model

NSCEB

National Strategic Community Engagement Board

OCU

Operational Command Unit

ODA

Olympic Delivery Authority

OSD

Olympic Security Directorate

OSP

Olympic Security Programme

OSSU

Olympic Site Support Unit

SE’s

Supporting Effects

SNT

Safer Neighbourhood Team

C. Race and equality impact

1. This report has detailed how the MPS intends to deliver diversity and community focus to the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. Equality and the needs of the community will be addressed through every stage of the planning and delivery phases of the programme through a clearly defined and deliverable programme plan Diversity is mainstreamed within the OSP at a number of levels:

• At an organisational level through involvement in the corporate Diversity and Citizen focus forums
• At a programme level through engagement, monitoring and involvement by the Community Engagement workstream and the Programme Management Office
• At an OCU level through the identified and dedicated OSD Diversity Champion
• At an operational level through the OSSU

2. The OSD and the Programme Management Office will ensure that there is full compliance with EIAs throughout the Olympic planning process

3. The OSD will ensure that consultation on the Olympic Security planning within the MPS is addressed through:

• Regular tabled meetings with the MPS Staff associations and staff support groups
• Planned communication methods such as publications, bulletins and the use of the Intranet
• Face to face meetings with staff

4. The OSD will take every opportunity to grow, where required, and develop the OCU over the forthcoming years approaching the Games by continuing to adopt fair, open and transparent recruitment and selection processes. The OSD will take significant steps to address any issues of under-representation in any individual equality strand within its workforce, and will continue to address recruitment from a position of need and desire to have the OSD reflect the diverse background of London’s communities.

D. Financial implications

1. For 2007/08 the Home Office has made available £4.6m to fund policing security costs of the Games with the MPS receiving £4m of this funding. The Community Engagement Team is funded from this £4m allocation.

2. For the next CSR period (2008/09 to 2010/11) the Home Office has set aside funding in the region of £300m to cover Olympics-related policing costs. This funding will be held by the Home Office and accessed through business cases therefore any growth required for 2008/09 onwards will be subject to a business case being approved, both through MPS and MPA processes and then by the Home Office.

E. Background papers

None

F. Contact details

Report author: Superintendent Leroy Logan, MPS

For more information contact:

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

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