Nottinghamshire PEEL 2016
Legitimacy
How legitimate is the force at keeping people safe and reducing crime?
To what extent does the force treat all of the people it serves with fairness and respect?
Nottinghamshire Police continues to reinforce the importance of treating people with fairness and respect through its PROUD values. The workforce understands the importance of treating people fairly and with respect and the force regularly seeks feedback on people’s perceptions of fair and respectful treatment. The force engages with those who have less confidence in the police to increase their understanding of its commitment to fair and respectful treatment, particularly those who are fearful of the police. It also encourages the public to make complaints in order to improve its service. The force analyses complaints comprehensively, but this analysis is not always shared as widely as possible with managers and supervisors so that the organisation can act on this information. The force does not always show clearly what action it has taken to improve the way it treats people.
Areas for improvement
- The force should improve how it demonstrates that it has taken action to improve how it treats all the people it serves.
How well does the force ensure that its workforce behaves ethically and lawfully?
Nottinghamshire Police continues to ensure that its workforce behaves ethically and lawfully. There is an ethical culture and the workforce understands what serious corruption is and how to report it. The force clarifies and reinforces unacceptable behaviour effectively. There are gaps in its vetting processes in respect of the force’s ability to assure itself that designated posts are vetted to a specific standard, but it identifies early warning signs of potential risks to integrity and corruption by sharing information internally and with other forces.
The abuse of authority for sexual gain is understood by the workforce as serious corruption and the force prosecutes any officers or staff in court. There are good prevention and early intervention mechanisms in place for potential corruption and for ensuring the effective security of its systems. However, the annual integrity health check form is poorly understood and poorly completed, which means the force cannot be sure it is able to monitor or understand risks to the integrity of the organisation.
The force decided not to progress the recommendation we made in 2014 on ensuring compliance with declined applications for secondary employment or business interests. However, it is now working more effectively to ensure there are proactive counter-corruption processes in respect of all staff posted to the EMSOU.
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 – Nottinghamshire Police
Areas for improvement
- The force should ensure the business interest and notifiable association policies are current, effectively communicated to staff and properly managed.
To what extent does the force treat its workforce with fairness and respect?
Nottinghamshire Police can identify and has a good understanding of those issues that have the greatest impact on workforce perceptions of fair and respectful treatment. It has taken some action to address some of these concerns, but sometimes it is unclear to the workforce what these actions are. However, some issues are still perceived as being unfair, such as fair access to opportunities to develop.
The force demonstrates that it understands and values the benefits of workforce wellbeing and has plans to conduct a wellbeing assessment. The physical environment is managed well. It is working to improve measures to support mental health but there are signs that staff are overworked.
Nottinghamshire Police is not able to demonstrate whether its performance assessment process is fair or effective. It is based on an assumption that the workforce is competent and although a performance assessment is required to be completed annually, there is no monitoring of compliance. There are some good informal performance assessment practices. However, some officers and staff have not had an assessment of performance for some time.
Areas for improvement
- The force should improve how it communicates the action it has taken in response to issues identified by the workforce.
- The force should ensure staff receive their annual leave entitlement and that they take the rest days owed to them, to support their health and wellbeing.
- The force should improve how it manages individual performance.