Merseyside PEEL 2017
Effectiveness
How effective is the force at keeping people safe and reducing crime?
How effective is the force at preventing crime, tackling anti-social behaviour and keeping people safe?
This question was not inspected in 2017. The grade and findings from last year’s inspection still stand.
How effective is the force at investigating crime and reducing re-offending?
This question was not inspected in 2017. The grade and findings from last year’s inspection still stand.
How effective is the force at protecting those who are vulnerable from harm, and supporting victims?
Merseyside Police is good at identifying vulnerability. The force:
- has a good understanding of the scale and nature of vulnerability in its area and proactively seeks hidden vulnerability;
- has well-developed relationships with partner organisations, enabling it to support vulnerable people and address the needs of victims; and
- generally investigates complex crimes involving vulnerable victims well.
Call handlers were empathetic and responsive to callers’ requirements. Call handlers have access to standard operating procedures for calls relating to sexual offences and domestic incidents.
However, further work is needed to ensure the force accurately records risk assessments. Guidance for call handlers on vulnerability and mental health problems could be improved.
The force is well able to identify and support people with mental health conditions. It:
- understands its mental health role, and its partnership arrangements work well;
- has a well-established and evaluated triage car service to respond effectively to vulnerable persons; and
- has invested in specialist mental health investigators and four specialist detectives within mental health establishments to assist with investigations and support vulnerable victims and families.
The force makes good use of the available powers to protect victims of domestic abuse. It has increased its use of domestic violence protection notices and orders in 2017.
Less positively, the force does not survey victims of domestic abuse, relying on feedback from independent domestic violence advisors. By limiting the data in this way, the force is not ensuring consistent corporate learning.
The force should ensure that less complex crimes are allocated promptly to investigators with the appropriate skills and accreditation, and ensure consistent supervision to promptly investigate them to a good standard.
Areas for improvement
- The force should ensure that less complex crimes are allocated promptly to investigators with the appropriate skills and accreditation, and ensure consistent supervision to promptly investigate them to a good standard.
- The force should implement a process to obtain feedback from victims of domestic abuse.
- The force should ensure that it accurately records the structured risk-assessments completed by call handlers to identify vulnerability to inform the continuing response, supervision and investigations.
How effective is the force at tackling serious and organised crime?
This question was not inspected in 2017. The grade and findings from last year’s inspection still stand.
How effective are the force’s specialist capabilities?
National threats often require forces to work together, across force boundaries. These threats include terrorism, large-scale disorder and civil emergencies. We examined the capabilities in place to respond to these threats, in particular a firearms attack.
Most positively, the force:
- works with other organisations to improve its response to the national threats;
- tests its skills and capabilities in training exercises; and
- regularly checks that it can mobilise large numbers of officers should a major incident occur.
However, the force needs to deepen its understanding of the threats and risks caused by the criminal use of firearms in Merseyside.