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Humberside PEEL 2016

Legitimacy

How legitimate is the force at keeping people safe and reducing crime?

Last updated 08/12/2016
Good

Humberside Police has been assessed as good in respect of the legitimacy with which it keeps people safe and reduces crime.

Humberside Police understands the importance of treating the people it serves with fairness and respect, actively seeking feedback and challenge from the community about the extent to which it does so. The force has a good understanding of local and national corruption threats, and has a robust vetting process in place.

Humberside Police understands the importance of treating the people it serves with fairness and respect. This is intrinsic to its vision and values, which are well understood by the workforce. The force actively seeks feedback and challenge about the extent to which it treats members of the public with fairness and respect, including those from new or emerging communities and those groups that have less trust and confidence in the police.

The force listens to and acts on information from communities, the Independent Police Complaints Commission, independent custody visitors and others within discrete business areas. However, the force website does not describe the force’s accumulated activities in response to feedback to improve treatment and fairness.

The force has a good understanding of local and national corruption threats, and these have informed its intelligence requirements and prevention activities. The force has a robust vetting process, including reviews in advance of a role change or promotion. It clarifies and reinforces expected standards of behaviour to those in post using, for example, posters and proactive professional development days to discuss ethical dilemmas.

The force has a good range of approaches to gather timely intelligence, in line with approved practice, but it could do more to identify officers who have abused – or are at risk of abusing – their authority for sexual gain.

The force publicises misconduct hearings for police officers and police staff, and shares the outcomes internally with staff and on the force’s website. It has also acted on all five recommendations from HMIC’s 2014 police integrity and corruption inspection.

The force has a range of methods – including a staff forum – to identify issues that affect the workforce’s perceptions of fair and respectful treatment, but it could do more to show how feedback has been used to make improvements.

The force values the benefits of workforce wellbeing and has established good provision to support it. Supervisors are adequately prepared and supported in their wellbeing responsibilities.

The force’s individual performance assessment process was not effective at the time of the inspection. It launched a new one in June 2016. The force’s processes to tackle poor individual performance were unsatisfactory.

Questions for Legitimacy

1

To what extent does the force treat all of the people it serves with fairness and respect?

Good

The force uses a wide range of methods to engage with the communities it serves and to understand the needs of emerging communities and groups with less trust and confidence in the police. Issues are identified from this work and addressed, or, if more systemic, shared with the relevant command for action. The force can show that it listens to and acts on information from communities, the IPCC, the ICVS, etc. within discrete business areas, but there is no effective way to monitor feedback to the force.

There is no complete picture of how the force treats, or is perceived to treat, its communities. The website does not inform the public of accumulated activities to improve treatment and fairness in response to the feedback it has received.

Areas for improvement

  • The force should improve how it seeks feedback from the people it serves about their perceptions of how the police have treated them.

2

How well does the force ensure that its workforce behaves ethically and lawfully?

Good

The force has a robust vetting process. All officers, staff contractors and volunteers are vetted to the designated standard and subject to regular reviews, as well as on change of role or promotion. The force uses a range of methods to clarify and reinforce standards of behaviour. Most resonant among staff have been the proactive professional development days focused on discussion of ethical dilemmas.

The force has a good understanding of local and national corruption threats, and these have informed its intelligence requirements and prevention activities. It has a good range of approaches to intelligence gathering. Intelligence is evaluated promptly, recorded in line with approved practice and developed in a timely fashion.

The force is not undertaking proactive intelligence gathering with women’s refuges, sexual health clinics and charities supporting sex workers to identify potential corruption and encourage reporting of inappropriate behaviour. The force publicises misconduct hearings for police officers and police staff, and shares the outcomes internally with staff and on its website.
The force has addressed all five recommendations made by HMIC following our police integrity and corruption inspection in 2014.

In our 2016 national overview of police legitimacy, we recommended that all forces should have started to implement a plan to achieve the capability and capacity required to seek intelligence on potential abuse of position for sexual gain. In 2017, we reviewed of the plans put in place by all forces to in response to this recommendation.

Abuse of position assessment – Humberside Police

3

To what extent does the force treat its workforce with fairness and respect?

Requires improvement

Humberside Police uses various methods to identify issues that affect the workforce’s perceptions of fair and respectful treatment, including a staff forum for identifying concerns. However, the force could do more to show how it understands issues that affect the workforce, and how feedback has been used to make improvements.

The force understands the benefits of workforce wellbeing and shows a commitment to it – including mental wellbeing – through a range of wellbeing provision, including intervening early to prevent problems from escalating by providing additional training for supervisors on their wellbeing responsibilities.

The force’s PDR system is limited and not used consistently by the workforce. HMIC found several staff who had not had a PDR for several years. The force launched a new electronic PDR system (ePDR) in June 2016. The force also has unsatisfactory processes for tackling poor performance within the workforce. The force has previously under-invested in staff professional development linked to performance although the introduction of a professional practice development day, and ongoing review of performance, aims to improve the performance of its operational officers.

Areas for improvement

  • The force should improve how it manages individual performance.