Agenda and draft minutes

The Chair welcomed members and guests to the meeting which was sitting as the Crime and Disorder Scrutiny Committee.

The minutes of the meeting held on 1 July 2014 were received.

Please note that, in accordance with the Members' Code of Conduct, when declaring interests members must disclose the existence and nature of the interest, and whether it is a disclosable pecuniary interest (DPI) or personal and/or pecuniary.

No declarations of interest were received.

Briefing by Sam Barstow, Public Protection and Anti-Social Behaviour, Service Manager, City of Lincoln Council

Sam Barstow, Public Protection and Anti-Social Behaviour, Service Manager, delivered a power point presentation on the Community Safety Partnership (CSP) and how it affected Lincoln.

He explained that the CSP was a legal statutory body that worked with multiple agencies (statutory and non-statutory) and its requirement was to establish a joint community safety plan and consult with the public on community safety issues. The CSP did not have a budget.

Sam Barstow continued by explaining in detail the following:

·         Every 3 years priorities were set and these were chosen from

o   Volume crime

o   High harm areas

o   Multi agency involvement

·         Partnership process

·         High harm areas

·         Priority areas established Strategic Management Boards

·         Priority areas established a strategic plan

He explained the detail within the three tiers in his presentation:

·         Strategic tier

·         Tactical tier

·         Operational tier

Sam Barstow concluded by suggesting that this committee would be a suitable forum  to scrutinise the work that the CSP carried out.

Presentation by Simon Walters, Assistant Director, Strategic Development, City of Lincoln Council

Simon Walters, Assistant Director – Strategic Development, delivered a power point  presentation about Lincoln Crime Figures. The presentation covered the categories of crime in Lincoln with comparison to its CIPFA nearest neighbours. Different categories of crime were compared with Lincoln and other towns in Lincolnshire. The presentation also identified crime hot spots in Lincoln. The time line for categories of crime comparisons was between 2013-2014 and 2014–2015.

Simon Walters explained that the two crime data sources used in the presentation were from:

• ONS (Office for National Statistics)
• Police.uk

When compared to its nearest neighbours during the period 2014/15 Lincoln had the highest rate per 1,000 people for:

·         bicycle theft

·         miscellaneous crimes against society

·         shoplifting

·         theft from person

·         homicide(3 murders)

The presentation concluded with Simon Walters asking members of the committee and guests for comments and questions.

Briefing by Sam Barstow, Public Protection and Anti-Social Behaviour, Service Manager, City of Lincoln Council

Sam Barstow as Service Manager for Public Protection and Anti-Social Behaviour delivered a power point briefing on the key projects, implementation and review of policies and new regulations.  He explained that there had been:

·         89 prosecutions in the previous 12 months and 35 of these were under the legislation introduced in 2015.

·         20 prosecuted breaches of the PSPO (Public Space Protection Order) .

·         457 fixed penalty notices issued since November 2015

·         89% payment rates and 100% successful prosecutions for non- payment of fixed penalties

Sam Barstow concluded the presentation by asking members of the committee for their comments and questions.

Comment: The figure of 94.6 per thousand for crime for Lincoln city seemed very high in comparison to the figure for East Midlands of 57 per 1,000.

Response: As Lincoln is the urban centre of a much wider area, people tend to come to the city to work and enjoy their leisure time. Therefore crimes tend to follow and offenders didn’t necessarily reside in the city.

Question: Where does funding come from for the CSP and why isn’t more money directed towards Lincoln?

Response: As stated earlier the CSP does not have a budget, the strategic management boards feeding into the CSP received funding in their own right for example:

·         The County Council and Public Health fund Domestic Abuse

Comment: The statistics for Lincoln did show the city in a poor light.

Response: It was noted that there were caveats with the statistics. Unfortunately the ONS didn’t show that outsiders came into the city to commit crime and all cities faced this problem. The ONS figures were for 2014/15.

The CSP wanted to promote their progress year on year. A police snapshot as of the 26 July 2016 showed that 2,700 crimes were committed since April and this was a down turn. There was an issue that nationally violent crimes were rising. Lincolnshire Police were not happy just to accept that and were working closely with partners to ‘buck’ the national trend.

Chief Superintendent Woods stated that Lincoln was the 3^rd best performing force in the UK and they would continue to provide a quality service with quality investigation.

Question: What was classed as ‘other crime’ listed in the ONS statistics?

Response: These consisted of miscellaneous crimes which covered a large range of crime types including:

·         Going equipped

·         Handling stolen goods

·         Assisting suicide

·         Dangerous driving

Question: What would happen when the inevitable further cuts happened?

Response: Prioritisation would be required along with partners coming together and not working in isolation. Money could not be wasted and it would be important to ensure enough officers were in the right areas,  this would be ongoing with regular scrutiny. More support was needed from Mental Health within the NHS.

Comment: The police statistics showed an increase in violent offences.

Response: Violence against the person with injuries could include bodily harm, endangering road users and injuries from dogs. Violence without injury  included assaults on police and letters with intent. Chief Inspector Woods explained that the main time for violence had been during the night time economy however more people were now drinking at home. Victims of violent abuse in the home were being encouraged to report these incidents. Nationally Lincolnshire was performing well but they were not complacent. Chief Superintendent Woods stated that there had been an increase in sexual offences, both historical and new. Specialist teams were required to deal with these offences as they were often very complex.

Sam Barstow advised that one of the key focuses of the Domestic Abuse  ...  view the full minutes text for item 6.

You are asked to resolve that the press and public be excluded from the meeting during the consideration of the following items because it is likely that if members of the press or public were present, there would be disclosure to them of 'exempt information'

RESOLVED that the press and public be excluded from the meeting during consideration of the following item(s) of business because it was likely that if members of the public were present there would be a disclosure to them of ‘exempt information’ as defined by Section 100I and Schedule 12A to the Local Government Act 1972.

Overview by Chief Superintendent Paula Woods, Lincolnshire Police

Chief Superintendent Paula Woods presented the Police Performance Overview for Lincoln which covered the period up to July 2016. The report showed that there was a reduction in overall crime for this period and members of the committee noted the contents.