Archived decisions

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Contact: Dave Higlett Ext: 7385 e-mail: [email protected]

1. Summary

1.1 This report confirms the County Council's strategic leadership role on community safety. Following the review of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 and last year's CPA corporate assessment, developing central capacity and leadership in the County Council to support community safety emerged as one of our top priorities for action. This is consistent with the County Council's corporate objective of making `Hampshire safer and more secure for all'.

1.2 This report also identifies how we will both develop that role and build greater central capacity to improve.

2 Recommendations

That approval be given to:

1.. The proposed direction of travel for the Crime and Disorder Strategy

2. The capacity building arrangements as detailed in section 8.

3. The internal arrangements to embed more activities to reduce crime and disorder into mainstream services.

3. Introduction to leadership role

3.1 A review of the Crime and Disorder Act in respect of Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnerships (CDRP) was undertaken by the Home Office, the Local Government Association (LGA), the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) and the Association of Police Authorities (APA) between November 2004 and January 2005 leading to orders by the Secretary of State published in July 2007 and coming into force in August 2007 alongside guidance and partnership standards¹. The regulations included as a requirement in two tier areas that a County Strategy Group for Crime and Disorder [CSGCD] be established to work with district CDRPs to prepare a County Community Safety Agreement [CSA]. The CSA to set out the key objectives and actions for how activity can be better co-ordinated across the area and how partners would contribute. The objectives should not only be based on an aggregation of the new statutory assessments carried out by each district CDRP, but also consider county wide strategic issues.

3.2 At the same time, the County Council was required to lead the preparation of a new statutory Local Area Agreement. The Crime and Disorder LAA targets should be consistent with the objectives in the County Strategy for Crime and Disorder.

3.3 From 2008/9, the Home Office funding previously directed to district CDRPs and latterly through the LAA Grant, was included in the new Area Based Grant, which forms part of the County Council's budget and for which the County Council is now responsible. This is a non ring-fenced three-year settlement. The County Council is in a position to consider how this might be used more strategically alongside mainstream resources of partners rather than acting merely as a `banker' for district CDRPs. This opens up the possibility of a more specific review of activities and the joining up of District based activity much of which has been effective on the ground. The Home Office funding is limited and has previously been subject to in-year cuts, providing challenges to partners. The County Council has previously acted to mitigate the impact of these cuts, for example by providing extra financial support for the County Domestic Violence Co-ordinator and Alcohol Co-ordinator.

3.4 The Audit Commission Assessment Team have recommended that ` the Council should improve its capacity to support its top priority of `Hampshire safer and more secure for all'. The team noted that at present the County Council does not have sufficient corporate capacity to support the work it will be doing with partners on the county level Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnership (CDRP) nor to make sure that its approach to crime and disorder is fully mainstreamed throughout the Council. This report sets out a direction of travel to increase capacity and to co-ordinate and embed this activity in mainstream work.

4. An overview of crime and disorder in Hampshire

4.1 Across a range of crime categories, recorded crime in Hampshire is falling and detections by Hampshire Constabulary have increased. Hampshire remains one of the safest places to live in the country with rates around two-thirds of those for England and Wales overall. Of greatest concern is violence against the person where the rising trend and position relates partly to a much more comprehensive recording process but also reflects crimes at the medium and lower ends of this category, especially those caused by alcohol misuse. This is where the Local Area Agreement (LAA) targets have been focused.

4.2 People in Hampshire generally feel very safe in their area during the daytime but as expected this falls markedly during the evening. The trend in perception is not always consistent with overall crime rates but does appear to be consistent with the increases in violent crime, largely due to alcohol related events. According to Audit Commission data, in 9 out of 11 districts more than 40% of residents consider there is a big or fairly big problem of rowdy and drunken behaviour. Perceptions are also often linked to local and national media coverage and Hampshire has led the development of the innovative crime mapping system (Crime & Disorder Data Information Exchange (CADDIE)) to provide accurate access to information on local crime statistics to the public.

4.3 Domestic abuse is a serious and widespread problem nationally. One in five relationships in the UK is affected by domestic abuse. In 2007/08 in the Hampshire County Council area, the police recorded 4,741 domestic violence crimes with a sanction detection rate of almost 46%.² There is a significant focus to encourage more reporting which should be taken into account when considering the steady increase in the police statistics. This is also an area of focus for the LAA and there is considerable interest in establishing a family justice centre for the Hampshire area.

5. Approach to date by the County Council

5.1 The County Council's approach to crime reduction and community safety agreed following the Crime & Disorder Act 1998, set 6 main policy aims:

· minimise school exclusions, truancy and underperformance by measures including encouragement and support for learning


· divert young people away from crime and the risk of crime


· initiate and support community based projects in areas where there are special needs or which are recognised as being disadvantaged


· refocus economic development to enhance local employment prospects


· provide for community safety and crime reduction measures through land use and transportation planning and environmental management schemes


· deal effectively and speedily with young offenders

5.2 The approach agreed was that the contribution to crime and disorder reduction is through the delivery of mainstream services and participation in district level CDRPs. (see http://www3.hants.gov.uk/crime ). In addition Hampshire has a Drug and Alcohol Team (DAAT) and a Youth Offending Team (YOT), both of which are employed through the County Council but partnership funded. The County Council also provides funding for specialised services such as training for the domestic violence support service (DV).

5.3 The approach was developed to include:

· a partnership arrangement with Hampshire constabulary for a Partnership Chief Inspector to work with the County Council and CDRPs based in the Chief Executive's Department.


· the development of the community safety service through the Accredited Community Safety Officers (ACSOs) based in PBRS.


· leading the partnership project "Crime & Disorder Data Information Exchange" (CADDIE), which provides a valuable data and evidence base for service planning for CDRPs and other partners. CADDIE was launched in April 2007 by the Leader and operates alongside the ACSO service in PBRS. CADDIE has also proved extremely popular with our residents as evidenced by over 1 million web hits in its first twelve months.


· Contribution to the establishment of the Single Non-Emergency Number, which enables the public to report non-emergency incidents, which is used inter-alia to assist the deployment of ACSOs.

5.4 The above demonstrates significant progress to date

6. Direction of travel following the new statutory orders: a strategic
approach

6.1 The County Council began the development of the CSG with an inaugural meeting in October 2007 chaired by the Executive Member for Community Development and External Affairs. Three further meetings have resulted in the following progress being made:

· Engagement of all statutory agencies, including the chairs of each district CDRP

· An agreed constitution and programme of core business

· Agreed strategic priorities for the County Agreement linked to the LAA safer communities targets [see Appendix 1]


· Agreed arrangements for the funding of CDRP based activity in 2008/9 (with a review later this year)


· Agreement to a shift towards evidence based commissioning to deliver the objectives and actions in the County Agreement with a commissioning sub-group established. This will relate both to the Area Based Grant (Safe and Strong Communities element) and wider mainstream resources of partners where there is an opportunity for improved co-ordination.


· Agreement to, and establishment of a performance sub-group to assist in the performance management of the safer communities LAA targets.


· Agreement to hold an annual community safety conference with the first in the Autumn of 2008.


· An agreed approach to more effective future assessment and planning processes to meet statutory requirements that goes beyond an aggregation of district assessments.

6.2 This represents further significant progress in a short space of time, against a backdrop of complex partnership arrangements and the need to establish trust and collective commitment, especially around sensitive issues of funding. This approach will also allow the county wide group the opportunity to improve performance management and review value for money in a range of other activities.

7. Commissioning and performance

7.1 The development of the commissioning and performance sub groups will be a key element in driving the delivery of the CSA and creates the opportunity to bring together partner resources. Each group is comprised of senior officers from County Council Departments, the Constabulary, Probation, PCT, Fire & Rescue, Youth Offending Team and CDRP practitioners.

7.2 The Commissioning Group has been tasked with preparing a commissioning strategy for the delivery of the County Agreement, with flexibility to address performance issues throughout the period. The strategy will deal not just with the use of the ABG Safe and Strong Communities funding but will also address areas of mainstream funding where there is an opportunity for improvement. Proposals for 2009-10 and beyond will be presented in the Autumn to assist budgetary planning.

7.3 The performance sub-group has been tasked with monitoring performance against objectives and LAA targets, identifying strengths, weaknesses and risks, making recommendations for ameliorative action and influencing the commissioning strategy. The group will report quarterly.

8. Central capacity for leadership and co-ordination

8.1 Given the demands of this strategic leadership role and the recommendations from the CPA Team, it is recognised that central capacity needs to be built. This will help accelerate this work, improve co-ordination and effectiveness of partnership working around the community safety agenda. It will also support the continued mainstreaming of activity to promote community safety across County Council services in line with the County Council's corporate priority

and the statutory duty under section 17 of the Crime and Disorder Act³.

8.2 The County Council's Deputy Leader chairs the County Strategy Group and appoints County Council representatives on each of the District CDRPs.

8.3 The central management of community safety will therefore now be undertaken by the Property Business and Regulatory Services Department, alongside the operational community safety work with corporate policy advice and support from the Chief Executive's Department. A management post has been established within PBRS to take on this function. Together with the CADDIE post and an administrative post funded through partnership arrangements, this addresses the issues of central capacity and provides the opportunity to co-ordinate the different strands of activity and further embed activity within County Council services. It is proposed to review this position and the outcomes as part of the budget preparation for 2009/10.

9. Key milestones and next steps

9.1 The following timeline shows the key milestones so far and the next steps.

Section 100 D - Local Government Act 1972 - background documents

The following documents discuss facts or matters on which this report, or an important part of it, is based and have been relied upon to a material extent in the preparation of this report.

NB: the list excludes:

1. Published works

2. Documents, which disclose exempt or confidential information as, defined in the Act. (Quote list of documents here: either "none" if 1 or 2 above apply; or list the relevant letters, memos, etc. and their location)