Cheshire's police chief says staff are improving how they log and record organised crime

Cheshire's top police chief says work's already started to improve the way the force logs, understands and documents serious and organised crime.

It's after inspectors graded their involvement in the North West's crime unit as 'adequate'.

Chief Constable Mark Roberts, of Cheshire Constabulary told our Chief Reporter: "The principal or only area of improvement was the way we document these plans and make sure people are aware of them, so that's easily fixable.

"I think the good news is that when people think of organised crime, we don't have people getting shot, we are taking the drug dealers out and we're taking the money off them."

What did inspectors say needed to improve?

His Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) published the following:

"The constabulary should continue to improve training on recording SOC threat assessments and disruption activity on APMIS.

"As of 4 January 2023, Cheshire Constabulary had recorded 118 SOC threats on APMIS. However, none of these assessments were completed for SOC vulnerabilities, such as county lines. For the year ending 31 December 2022, the constabulary recorded 373 disruptions on the APMIS, of which 312 (84 percent) were recorded as pursue activity. When we interviewed members of the constabulary, it appeared that they lacked understanding of the different SOC threat types. This means they aren’t properly assessing all SOC threats and then prioritising them to be managed.

"There is no head of intelligence analysis, which places additional demand on senior analysts

"The role of head of intelligence analysis is recognised nationally by the College of Policing. They should oversee analytical teams to make sure that they are professionally competent and can provide strategic and tactical analytical functions. At the time of our inspection, Cheshire Constabulary didn’t have a head of intelligence analysis. We found analysts and senior analysts were being managed by a detective sergeant. Senior analysts spend significant amounts of time attending meetings, which diverts them from managing their teams.

"Cheshire Constabulary should improve the quality of its 4P plans

"Following a review in 2022, the constabulary introduced a new format for its 4P plans. During our inspection, we reviewed several of its 4P plans. We identified several concerns:

• It wasn’t always clear who the plan owner was.

• Actions weren’t always clear.

• Some plans were out of date.

• Some plans appeared to be generic and contained actions that weren’t tailored to tackle the specific serious organised crime threat.

We were told that the constabulary intends to improve these plans. However, we found there was still work to do and we weren’t assured that 4P plans are currently driving operational activity or being used to monitor performance.

"The constabulary should make sure officers and staff understand how serious crime prevention orders are managed.

"The constabulary has secured several serious crime prevention orders (SCPOs). Information about these SCPOs is held on the constabulary intranet. At the time of our inspection, all subjects of these orders were in prison. Responsibility for managing and enforcing ancillary orders is currently assigned to the team managing the original investigation, which may not be appropriate. LROs appeared to understand the offender management processes. But some interviewees we spoke to weren’t clear on the process to manage SCPOs when offenders are released back into the community. The constabulary should review its process and make sure that personnel understand their role in managing SCPOs

Chief Constable Mark Roberts added: "The North West has its issues but we haven't had a criminal discharge of a firearm since April 2020, we've got generally really low levels of violence and in terms of drugs we're really effective at tackling the drugs gangs who'd like to come and work in the county."

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