Agenda item

The purpose of this report is to enable the Scrutiny & Overview Committee to review the performance of the Community Safety Partnership with a view to seeking reassurance on the effectiveness of the partnership.

The Committee considered a report set out on pages 13 – 116 of the agenda which provided an overview of the performance of the Community Safety Partnership (CSP) and included a draft version of the 2022 Strategic Assessment. The report had been scheduled for consideration by the Committee to allow reassurance to be sought on the performance of the partnership.

The Cabinet Member for Community Safety, Councillor Ola Kolade, and members of the Partnership, including the local Chief Superintendent from the Metropolitan Police, Dave Stringer, and the Director of Culture & Community Safety, Kristian Aspinall, were in attendance for this item.

The first question on this item asked why 50% of women in a recent survey had indicated that they felt unsafe in the borough? It was advised that of the 1,200 women surveyed, the findings indicated that key areas where people felt unsafe were public transport and bus stops. As such it will be essential to have intervention in place to tackle these concerns. Two key issues for Croydon were public safety and domestic abuse with over 5,000 cases in the past year. The Mayor would be releasing a statement at the next Cabinet meeting to announce a three year plan targeted towards tackling violence against women and girls.  The focus of the Violence Against Women and Girl delivery plan would range from tackling low level issues such as cat calling to serious domestic violence.

Although there was high level data available, it was acknowledged that further work was needed to gather detailed data about why people felt unsafe in the borough. The Police had launched a Walk and Talk scheme with female police officers to meet people in specific areas of concern, which would start to help understand the problems.

As domestic violence was an existing strategic priority for the CSP and the level of domestic violence had increased year on year for the past five year, it was questioned how the new strategy could make a difference. It was advised that reporting incidents of domestic violence should be encouraged and the partnership work between the Family Justice Centre (FJC) and the Police had led to increased levels of reporting. The potential number of unreported incidents was of greater concern and required further work to understand the scale of the problem.

It was questioned whether there was sufficient capacity within the FJC to cope with the demand for its services. It was confirmed that the FJC worked with high risk cases, and medium and low risk cases were passed to third sector organisations to manage capacity. It was a challenge to manage the capacity of the service, but it had been successful at drawing additional resource from the Home Office and other sources because of its good reputation.

It was advised that the FJC provided support for high risk cases to help reduce the risk to the point that they could be passed to other organisations to continue the support.  Although the service managed high risk cases, it also managed the exit programme for people leaving abusive relationships and provided training for other teams and services.

There was a concern that the cost of living crisis could lead to a further surge in domestic violence and as such it was questioned whether the service was prepared for this. It was advised that there was a lot of work underway across the Council on the cost of living crisis, but at this stage it was too early to say whether it would lead to increased levels of domestic violence. Current data demonstrated that the level of domestic abuse in the borough was already high and would continue to be managed through the FJC and its partner organisations.

It was questioned whether there was a risk that people would be reluctant to report on-street harassment because they did not want to be seen to be wasting Police time. It was highlighted that there was a recent public meeting in the borough to discuss the issue of on-street harassment which would help the partnership to learn from lived experience. It was also highlighted that people did not need to ring the 999 emergency number to report on-street harassment, as there were other methods of reporting such incidents.

Regarding methods of combating on-street harassment, it was questioned whether this would include going into schools to talk to pupils. It was agreed that early intervention on behaviours was a key part of how this type of crime could be tackled as part of a wider strategy. It was noted that the FJC ran regular training sessions for the safeguarding leads in schools and learning about healthy relationships was part of the curriculum, with the FJC consulted on delivery. There was always more that could be done and this work was ongoing.

Further information on what would be included in the statement of intent due to be considered at the next Cabinet meeting was requested. It was advised that following a public meeting on the response to a recent high profile case in the borough, the Mayor decided to bring forward a statement to note that the Council was aware of the issues in the borough. There were areas such as public safety and antisocial behaviour that were being worked on and there were additional sources of income that could be used to help address some of this behaviour. In summary, the statement would acknowledge the current situation and make a commitment on what the Council would do in advance of the full plan.

It was questioned whether the domestic abuse services available in the borough were able to engage with harder to reach communities. Although the FJC worked with local BME Forums and Violence Against Women and Girls Forums, it was acknowledged that further work was needed to reach black, minority ethnic and foreign women. It was sometimes the case that disclosure of domestic violence may be less likely culturally, so it was important to explore different ways of engaging on this issue including attending grassroot community groups to start discussions.

In response to a question about how the boundaries of the Public Space Protection Orders (PSPO) had been set, it was advised that they had been based on data indicating areas of antisocial behaviour. Before introducing a PSPO there needed to be a sufficient evidence base to justify why it was needed and the consultation on the boundaries for the new schemes was still open at the time of the meeting. The new PSPOs would be reviewed after the first two months of delivery to check whether there had been any displacement activity and whether the boundary needed to be adjusted.

It was understood that the previous PSPO in the borough had lapsed due to a lack of resources available to ensure it could be successfully delivered. As such it was questioned whether the new schemes would be different. In response it was highlighted that there had been an increase in Police resources and there would be a greater level of coordination with the Council on the use of the powers granted by a PSPO. Concurrently there would also be workstreams in place to provide people with wraparound support through outreach teams to address the root causes of anti-social behaviour. The key action in delivering a PSPO was to ensure the correct reporting was in place to provide the evidence required to renew it once the initial period elapsed.

It was questioned whether the CCTV system in the borough was sufficient to support the PSPO. It was confirmed that the CCTV was being upgraded and data had been used to ensure it provided good coverage of anti-social behaviour hotspots. Mobile cameras were also available to be deployed as needed.

It was suggested that there needed to be data analysis undertaken to establish whether there was a particular issue with anti-social behaviour in neighbourhoods with a high proportion of private rented properties. It was highlighted that residents living in the private rented accommodation often tended to be more transient and as such could be difficult to track, which may lead to a lack of understanding of the challenges faced by these residents.  In response it was advised that a Landlord Licensing Scheme could help in this area with a scheme currently being developed for Croydon, which was due to come forward in 2023. It was also advised that Community Protection Orders could be issued against landlords in certain circumstances which would lead to enforcement if not complied with. There remained concern that tenants living in the private rented sector did not receive the same level of support that might be provided to tenants living in either council or housing association properties and that further research was needed to understand the needs of residents in private rented accommodation.

Further information was requested about how crime reduction work was coordinated across borough boundaries. It was advised that many criminals tended to work within small areas but depending on the location the police would work with other forces, such as in Crystal Palace which was coordinated with forces in Lambeth and Bromley. The main area of focus for the Police was in the north of the borough, which involve lots of information sharing amongst the Cross Borough Command Units. There was also cooperation with Surrey Police to share information on issues affecting the south of the borough.

As the Community Safety Partnership was due to be reviewed, it was questioned whether there were plans to involve local communities and residents in this review. It was advised that the review process would start with the partners as this was a legal duty. Community meetings to inform the process had started and opportunities for residents to be involved in specific strands of work were being built into the process. It was recognised that unless residents were made part of the solution it would not be successful.

In response to a question about what the Partnership was doing to address the disproportional impact of crime on young black people, it was advised that tackling disproportionality was something to be tackled across the criminal justice system. As such it needed to be embedded in every aspect of the work of the Partnership. The Criminal Justice system was often the last service to get involved with others like schools and social care involved normally involved at an earlier stage. The job for the Police was to ensure they did not aggravate the existing disproportionality. Issues such as the use of stop and search, developing a greater understanding of the borough and working with parents and carers to support young people on the edge of crime were areas of specific focus.

At the conclusion of the item the Chair thanks the Cabinet Member and the representatives from the Community Safety Partnership for their engagement with the questions of the Committee.

Conclusions

Following its discussion of this item, the members of the Scrutiny & Overview Committee reached the following conclusions: -

1.   Following its review of the Community Safety Partnership, the Committee agreed that it would be supportive of a campaign to de-normalise low level sexual harassment against women, such as ‘cat-calling’, but recognised that any such campaign would be dependent on further resources being identified.

2.   The Committee welcomed confirmation that there would be an emphasis on recording offences in the town centre to provide evidence on the need for the Public Space Protection Order.  The Committee also welcomed the proposed review of this scheme in two months to make sure that anti-social behaviour doesn't simply shift to neighbouring areas.

3.   There was a concern about whether there was sufficient coordination of information between the Police and Council, but it was also acknowledged that the attendance of councillors at their local Ward Panel meetings may help to provide reassurance on this concern.

4.   The Committee agreed that the following information would be requested following the meeting: -

Recommendations: -

The Scrutiny & Overview Committee agreed to make the following recommendations for the consideration of the Executive Mayor at the next available Cabinet meeting:

1. The Committee would recommend that the evaluation criteria for the Violence against Women and Girls Strategy should include space for victims’ voices and exit questioning.
2. The Committee urges the Council and the mayor to publicly recognise and celebrate frontline workers who works so hard to help with violence against women during the pandemic and beyond, particularly the independent domestic violence workers at the Family Justice Centre.
3. The Committee welcomed the extra attention given to ‘high priority areas’ that suffer the vast majority of crime harm and recommends the creation of bespoke community plans to be created for these areas that involve their own unique community partners.
4. The Committee recommends the Police and the Council seek to partner with the voluntary sector on campaigns to de-normalise low level sexual harassment against women such as 'cat-calling'.
5. As it was heard that it would increase the powers available to the Council to tackle antisocial behaviour in the private rented accommodation, the Committee recommends the development of a Landlord Licensing Scheme for Croydon being treated as a priority.
6. There was a recognition that at present there had been insufficient analysis to understand the links between the private rented sector and crime. As such the Committee would recommend that a workstream on this is created to ensure that an understanding is developed. 
7. The Committee would recommend that an emphasis is placed upon community engagement in informing the review of the Community Safety Partnership, with engagement being as extensive as possible within available resources. This should include community, voluntary, faith and resident groups.
8. The Committee was supportive of the proposed youth engagement work outlined at the meeting and would recommend that work aimed at preventing crime was well embedded in future strategies.