Force management statement: Template for forces

Force management statement template

Your force management statement (FMS) should, above all else, be a comprehensive assessment of the demand you expect your force to face, the status of your workforce and assets, and how your force will change to meet that demand. It should cover all areas of your force. This template gives you the structure to do that and should be read in conjunction with the FMS guidance document.

Please contact us to discuss next steps should you need to deviate from the template and guidance to achieve the overall aim of the FMS.

Part 1: Summary

Please cover the main issues highlighted in your FMS. This should build a picture of the greatest risks to your force and the expected consequences of addressing or tolerating them. Then, please provide an overall statement on the findings of your assessment of the force. This should draw together cross-cutting themes and summarise the highest priorities.

There is no need to provide a force or chief officer history or generic descriptions of force-specific issues (such as seasonal variation). You don’t need to include sections of the police and crime plan, maps, photographs or too many infographics.

The UK has experienced a number of economic shocks over the last few years. We are especially concerned with how the cost-of-living crisis, including inflation and the risk of recession, is affecting your force. Please consider this at the appropriate points in your FMS and include relevant themes and priorities in your summary. You may wish to consider:

• the effect of the economic environment on the management of your force, your financial and other plans, your workforce costs, energy prices, and supply-chain pressures;
• the effect on your assessment of future demand and crime; and
• the effect on your people; recruitment, retention, morale, wellbeing, and the potential for corruption.

You should also include an assessment of how effective your force is at cutting crime. It should assess each of the building blocks that underpin effective crime reduction:

• bringing offenders to justice;
• reducing repeat victimisation and offending;
• preventing harm;
• preventing crime;
• performance management;
• community support; and
• workforce capacity and capability.

Please provide a statement about your force’s overall performance in reducing crime in each of these areas.

Declaration

Declaration (to be signed by chief constable/Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police/Commissioner of the City of London Police):

This is the force management statement for [name of police force]. Except where stated otherwise, the information in this statement is complete and accurate in all material respects.

Signed:

Date:

Strategic risk assessment summary

We would like your strategic risk assessment to be an assessment of the risk to the standard and resilience of the service you provide. It should also provide an indication of the areas of highest concern for the force. The risk assessment should be colour coded to provide a visual summary of the risks identified in your FMS.

You will need to consider both the demand on the force and the status of your workforce and other assets (their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply). The summary should cover every subsection of the FMS that is relevant to your force. It should include an assessment of the risk of harm to the public due to service failure or inadequacy. You may provide this as a qualitative narrative to accompany the strategic risk assessment.

As with previous FMSs, we are happy for you to use whichever risk assessment techniques, scoring and visual presentations you believe work best for your force, within these criteria. You should present a consolidated summary of the strategic risk assessments for each section of the FMS here.

Part 2: FMS sections

Section 1: Finance

This section is about your force’s current financial position, the projected changes in income and expenditure, any financial gaps to fund the changes proposed in the FMS and how you propose to fill them. You don’t need to follow the four steps for this section (see section 3a below or the FMS guidance document for more details on the four steps).

Your medium-term financial plan should give you most of the information. Please consider the revenue plans and where you will make investments or savings. Please consider the capital plans and any critical interdependencies that apply which may affect the force’s plans.

When discussing how you are using reserves, you may need to refer to your PEEL data for the outturn reserves for the end of the preceding financial year as a proportion of your net revenue expenditure. And you may need to consider how this compares with your previous forecast of that position.

Wherever you can, please set the financial assessment against each category of current and future demand your force faces. You should try to describe four main aspects:

• the extent to which your force is making best use of its financial resources;
• your assessment of the financial implications of future demand, including the current cost-of-living crisis. Please compare this with the budget you expect to get and the resources that budget makes available. (For example, increases in pay could mean reductions in staff numbers.) We have designed the FMS to help you show what you have done and will do to make efficiency savings, and the extent to which these will help close any gap between demand and financial resources;
• how you propose to mitigate or manage any major financial risks; and
• an organisation-wide financial assessment. This should include an assessment of your force’s current and future financial needs, alongside any changes in how much income you think your force will get.

Lastly, your financial statement should include the main findings from your most recent external audit report. You must include any references by the external auditor about the financial resilience of the force.

Section 2: Wellbeing

This section is about your force’s overall approach to the wellbeing of the people who work in it. You don’t need to follow the four steps for this section.

Please tell us how well your force understands wellbeing and tracks progress in this area. You need to give us an overall assessment of your force’s wellbeing and how you expect it to change. You should also give an assessment of the units, resources or departments dedicated to wellbeing, such as a force occupational health unit.

For the wellbeing assessment, please also include an assessment of the number of officers (by rank) and staff who exceed The Working Time Regulations 1998.

You might consider how your force is using the Blue Light Wellbeing Framework in this section.

We are also asking you to assess the current composition of your workforce. For example, you may want to reflect on the profile of diversity within your force or expected changes in the age or length-of-service profile of officers in your force.

Section 3a: Responding to the public – requests for service

This section is about how you deal with those who request a service from the police, especially emergency or urgent responses. It also includes how the public contact you through other means, such as emails or the front desk.

Step 1: Establish the difference between current demand and the demand that you expect in the foreseeable future or the next four years.

Step 2: Establish the current status of your workforce and other assets: their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply.

Step 3: Explain what you will do to make sure your workforce and other assets can meet the demand you are anticipating. Describe the expected effect of the planned changes and how this will be monitored.

Step 4: Estimate the extent of future demand that you expect to be met having made the changes and efficiencies in step 3. You should state any demand that you expect to be unmet and what the consequences of not meeting it are expected to be.

Section 3b: Responding to the public – incident response

This section is about how you respond to incidents, including where you do not deploy a resource.

Step 1: Establish the difference between current demand and the demand that you expect in the foreseeable future or the next four years.

Step 2: Establish the current status of your workforce and other assets: their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply.

Step 3: Explain what you will do to make sure your workforce and other assets can meet the demand you are anticipating. Describe the expected effect of the planned changes and how this will be monitored.

Step 4: Estimate the extent of future demand that you expect to be met having made the changes and efficiencies in step 3. You should state any demand that you expect to be unmet and what the consequences of not meeting it are expected to be.

Section 4: Prevention and deterrence (neighbourhood policing)

This section is about your force’s prevention, deterrence and community-based activities to reduce demand and make the community more confident in the police. Please describe your force’s activities at a community or neighbourhood level. This section should include an assessment of demand associated with alcohol and the evening and night-time economy.

Step 1: Establish the difference between current demand and the demand that you expect in the foreseeable future or the next four years.

Step 2: Establish the current status of your workforce and other assets: their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply.

Step 3: Explain what you will do to make sure your workforce and other assets can meet the demand you are anticipating. Describe the expected effect of the planned changes and how this will be monitored.

Step 4: Estimate the extent of future demand that you expect to be met having made the changes and efficiencies in step 3. You should state any demand that you expect to be unmet and what the consequences of not meeting it are expected to be.

Section 5: Investigations

This section is about investigations and the demand arising from crime. It includes digital and online crime investigation, intelligence, custody, forensic services and your criminal justice department. We also ask you to include demand from volume crime that you haven’t written about elsewhere in your FMS.

Step 1: Establish the difference between current demand and the demand that you expect in the foreseeable future or the next four years.

Step 2: Establish the current status of your workforce and other assets: their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply.

Step 3: Explain what you will do to make sure your workforce and other assets can meet the demand you are anticipating. Describe the expected effect of the planned changes and how this will be monitored.

Step 4: Estimate the extent of future demand that you expect to be met having made the changes and efficiencies in step 3. You should state any demand that you expect to be unmet and what the consequences of not meeting it are expected to be.

Section 6: Protecting vulnerable people

This section is about how your force identifies and safeguards vulnerable people and investigates offences against them. This doesn’t include the demand met as an initial response in section 2.

Please cover the main categories as they are organised in your force. This should include, but not be confined to:

• domestic abuse;
• child and adult safeguarding;
• child abuse;
• sexual offences;
• hate crime;
• so-called honour-based violence;
• female genital mutilation and forced marriage;
• human trafficking and forced labour;
• missing persons;
• people with mental health conditions or mental illness; and
• harassment, stalking and cyber bullying.

Step 1: Establish the difference between current demand and the demand that you expect in the foreseeable future or the next four years.

Step 2: Establish the current status of your workforce and other assets: their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply.

Step 3: Explain what you will do to make sure your workforce and other assets can meet the demand you are anticipating. Describe the expected effect of the planned changes and how this will be monitored.

Step 4: Estimate the extent of future demand that you expect to be met having made the changes and efficiencies in step 3. You should state any demand that you expect to be unmet and what the consequences of not meeting it are expected to be.

Section 7: Managing offenders

This category is about the demand that arises from managing people who have been convicted of offences and/or who present a risk to others. This includes registered sex offenders, repeat offenders and anyone else the force is managing because of its own assessment and analysis.

Step 1: Establish the difference between current demand and the demand that you expect in the foreseeable future or the next four years.

Step 2: Establish the current status of your workforce and other assets: their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply.

Step 3: Explain what you will do to make sure your workforce and other assets can meet the demand you are anticipating. Describe the expected effect of the planned changes and how this will be monitored.

Step 4: Estimate the extent of future demand that you expect to be met having made the changes and efficiencies in step 3. You should state any demand that you expect to be unmet and what the consequences of not meeting it are expected to be.

Section 8: Managing serious and organised crime

Please refer to the National Strategic Assessment, your force’s assessment and the regional strategic intelligence assessment to consider your force’s capacity and capability against serious and organised crime threats.

Your FMS in this section should include, but not be confined to:

• child sexual abuse and exploitation;
• modern slavery, human trafficking and organised immigration crime;
• firearms;
• drugs, including county lines activity;
• organised theft, robbery or burglary;
• money laundering;
• fraud and other economic crime;
• bribery and corruption;
• cyber crime; and
• serious violence, gang and knife crime.

Step 1: Establish the difference between current demand and the demand that you expect in the foreseeable future or the next four years.

Step 2: Establish the current status of your workforce and other assets: their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply.

Step 3: Explain what you will do to make sure your workforce and other assets can meet the demand you are anticipating. Describe the expected effect of the planned changes and how this will be monitored.

Step 4: Estimate the extent of future demand that you expect to be met having made the changes and efficiencies in step 3. You should state any demand that you expect to be unmet and what the consequences of not meeting it are expected to be.

Section 9: Major events

This section covers civil emergencies, public order, armed policing, roads policing and the Strategic Policing Requirement (SPR).

You should include an assessment of how you responded to the pandemic. You should also include any lessons learned and how the pandemic affects your planning and preparation for future civil emergencies.

You should include relevant information and analysis contained in your strategic firearms threat assessment.

Where you have outlined your approach to the SPR in other sections, you don’t need to repeat that information here. Under terrorism, please consider demands that will affect decisions made by your force such as Prevent or armed policing. We don’t require you to assess your regional counter-terrorism unit.

Your FMS should frame your approach to the policing capabilities required to counter the SPR threats. We understand that the risk from SPR threats varies and your FMS may need to be based on preparedness to respond to SPR threats.

Step 1: Establish the difference between current demand and the demand that you expect in the foreseeable future or the next four years.

Step 2: Establish the current status of your workforce and other assets: their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply.

Step 3: Explain what you will do to make sure your workforce and other assets can meet the demand you are anticipating. Describe the expected effect of the planned changes and how this will be monitored.

Step 4: Estimate the extent of future demand that you expect to be met having made the changes and efficiencies in step 3. You should state any demand that you expect to be unmet and what the consequences of not meeting it are expected to be.

Section 10: Knowledge management and ICT

This section is about how your intelligence, information and ICT assets make your force more efficient and effective, now and in the future. It includes how useful, accurate, timely and secure your data and information are, and the systems and processes used to gather, store, process, analyse and use information in your force. This section should include, but not be confined to:

• intelligence functions;
• performance management and the provision of management information;
• an assessment of your analytical capability;
• your plans to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of your force’s use of information technology;
• implementing the new Information and Records Management Code;
• any information technology and business intelligence programmes you are implementing, including advanced data science techniques such as machine learning, artificial intelligence and data mining;
• how they will improve value for money for the force; and
• when you expect to achieve these improvements.

Step 1: Establish the difference between current demand and the demand that you expect in the foreseeable future or the next four years.

Step 2: Establish the current status of your workforce and other assets: their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply.

Step 3: Explain what you will do to make sure your workforce and other assets can meet the demand you are anticipating. Describe the expected effect of the planned changes and how this will be monitored.

Step 4: Estimate the extent of future demand that you expect to be met having made the changes and efficiencies in step 3. You should state any demand that you expect to be unmet and what the consequences of not meeting it are expected to be.

Section 11: Force-wide functions

This section is about the functions of your force that you haven’t covered in other sections. This section should include, but not be confined to:

• HR functions;
• learning and development functions; and
• professional standards functions.

You can either present this section as an overall assessment or tell us about each function separately.

Step 1: Establish the difference between current demand and the demand that you expect in the foreseeable future or the next four years.

Step 2: Establish the current status of your workforce and other assets: their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply.

Step 3: Explain what you will do to make sure your workforce and other assets can meet the demand you are anticipating. Describe the expected effect of the planned changes and how this will be monitored.

Step 4: Estimate the extent of future demand that you expect to be met having made the changes and efficiencies in step 3. You should state any demand that you expect to be unmet and what the consequences of not meeting it are expected to be.

Section 12: Collaboration

Following the first FMS, some forces asked us to include a section on collaboration. Some collaborations may generate their own demand, or have resources allocated to making the collaboration work. This section is for you to use, if you need it, to tell us about the demand and resource that comes with working in collaboration. You don’t need to tell us about the work your units carry out through collaboration, as you will have covered that elsewhere.

Step 1:Establish the gap between current demand and demand you expect in the foreseeable future or the next four years.

Step 2: Establish the current and future status of your workforce and other assets: their performance, condition, capacity, capability, serviceability, wellbeing and security of supply.

Step 3: Explain what you will do to make sure your workforce and other assets can meet the demand you are anticipating. Describe the expected effect of the planned changes and how this will be monitored.

Step 4: Estimate the extent of future demand that you expect to be met having made the changes and efficiencies in step 3. You should state any demand that you expect to be unmet and what the consequences of not meeting it are expected to be.