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UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE To be published as HC 462-i House of COMMONS MINUTES OF EVIDENCE TAKEN BEFORE HOME AFFAIRS COMMITTEE
THE
MR TIM GODWIN and MR Evidence heard in Public Questions 1 - 58
USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT
Oral Evidence Taken before the Home Affairs Committee on Members present Keith Vaz, in the Chair Tom Brake Mr James Clappison Mrs Janet Dean Gwyn Prosser Bob Russell Mr David Winnick ________________ Witnesses: Mr Tim Godwin, Deputy Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, and Mr Kit Malthouse, Chair of the Metropolitan Police Association, gave evidence. Q1 Chair: I refer everyone to the Register of Members' Interests where the interests of Members of this Committee are noted. I welcome to the Committee the Deputy Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, Mr Godwin, and the Deputy Mayor and Chair of the Metropolitan Police Association, Mr Malthouse. This is a one-off inquiry which will look at the work of the Metropolitan Police. We are most grateful to both of you for coming today to talk about the work you are doing. Mr Malthouse, why did the Mayor take the decision to stand down as the chair of the MPA and ask you to chair it? Mr Malthouse: There were a number of reasons. At the very moment the Home Office regulations changed to allow the Mayor to become chair of the Police Authority he assumed the chairmanship because he wanted to achieve some specific tasks on the MPA: a shake-up of senior ranks in the Metropolitan Police Service which he effected immediately; reorganisation of the Police Authority which is now complete; and the setting of a longer-term strategy - three years - set out in a document we published called Met Forward about how the Metropolitan Police and the Metropolitan Police Authority should work together in future years. Fifteen months in he took the view that the chair of the Police Authority was a job that had two halves, if you like: one was about the administration of the Authority itself and the other was about contact, advice and influence with the Metropolitan Police. He wanted to increase the "influence" part of it and then pass the administration side to me. Therefore, he appointed me chair of the Authority but increased the amount of contact time he spends with the Commissioner in particular from a formal meeting once a month to a meeting once every two weeks, to receive more regular briefings from me on a weekly and monthly basis as well as speaking to me on a daily basis. That was part of a general reorganisation of his time so he could maximise his effort where he felt it was most critical - for him the critical connection was with the Commissioner - and minimise it where he thought he could wisely pass to me other tasks in this area. Q2 Chair: Perhaps I may put a couple of points that have been in the media
recently, which will give you a chance to respond. On 23 February Mr Malthouse: I confess to feeling slightly bruised by that story because the truth is that I am an ex officio member of every single committee on the Police Authority, as are four other individuals, by dint of being vice-chair and then chair. The intention is that as an ex officio member I can receive the papers formally and attend and participate in the meetings, but unfortunately as an ex officio member I cannot vote on those committees. It is a technicality because the Police Authority, unlike a lot of other authorities, does not have a substitution system. Therefore, when members are absent we cannot substitute people onto the committee. The fact I had not attended those committees was a reflection of a technicality. I receive all the papers of those committees and interact with the chairs on specific issues of concern and the work of those committees is steered through a mini-cabinet, if you like, called the business management group, which I chair and attend and that includes all the chairs of those committees. That was a rather inflation of a minor technicality. Q3 Chair: How would you describe your relationship with the Commissioner and other leaders? Obviously, the Deputy Commissioner is here today. You made some comments last September about having your hands on the tiller of the Met. What exactly does that mean? Mr Malthouse: As to your first question, as my boss, the Mayor, would say our relationship is positively glutinous. We get on extremely well on a professional and human level and obviously we work closely together. I see the Commissioner every Friday and we will probably speak to or bump into each other at meetings two or three times a week. We now have a shared aim about where we should be. The comments in the summer to which you allude were, again, an inflation of an interview I had given to the Guardian during which I had merely stated the obvious, namely that in our view it was for the Mayor and Police Authority to set the mission, for the Commissioner to decide how to achieve it and we then negotiate about how much it will cost. I believe the Commissioner expressed concern that that might be misinterpreted as an erosion of the principle of operational policing but that is completely incorrect. We are very keen to preserve that principle. Q4 Mr Winnick: I have listened to your explanation of why the Mayor stood down and was replaced by you as chair of the Police Authority. If I remember rightly, during his election campaign the Mayor made much of the fact that if elected he would chair the Police Authority. It seems rather odd that having placed so much emphasis on the fact he would do that, unlike his predecessor Mr Livingstone, that he has decided after 18 months that he does not want to do it and has given the job to you. Mr Malthouse: No, I do not believe that is peculiar. The Mayor said he thought it was important that the Mayor should take responsibility for crime in the capital and should be accountable to Londoners for the way the police went about their job, how the Police Authority functioned and ultimately for crime results in the city. He wanted to maintain that democratic accountability and initially demonstrated it by becoming chair of the Authority. He wanted to achieve specific things early on. Unfortunately, the rules allowing him to become chair did not kick in until the October after his election. We had suggested earlier to the then Labour chair that he might respect the mandate and stand aside but he declined to take that opportunity, so when the regulations changed Mr Johnson became the chair and achieved what he wanted to achieve. Then he wanted to allow time for him to strengthen what he believes to be the primary relationship in the city which is between him and the Commissioner. Q5 Mr Winnick: He gave the very strong impression that was the job he would do if elected but gave no indication that it would be for only a limited period. Mr Malthouse: I do not believe he indicated either way; he said he would chair the Authority. He believed that changes were required in the Metropolitan Police Authority. Q6 Mr Winnick: Did you advise Boris Johnson that the then Commissioner of Police, Sir Ian Blair, should be asked to leave, if not dismissed? Mr Malthouse: Obviously we discussed it. Q7 Tom Brake: To move to a different subject, some have claimed that the appointment of Mr Dizaei following a series of unproven allegations about his conduct was driven by a desire on the part of the MPA to appear politically correct. Could I ask both of you for your views on the current appointment process for senior officers? Mr Godwin: The Commissioner of Police has made it plain that where we now have very clear lines of accountability and governance with the Police Authority and the Home Office he is held accountable for delivering the mission just mentioned. At the same time, in order to be successful like chief executives who run their own businesses they will be allowed to pick their teams to ensure they have the best people to deliver. In saying that the Commissioner was not in any way criticising the current management team, with which he is very happy, but that discipline and control of the top police officer tier should also fall to him rather than an outside body. It is a reversal of the current practice, which is the Police Authority appoints in consultation with and following advice of the Commissioner. The Commissioner believes that for him to appoint following consultation with and advice from the Police Authority will give a far greater chance of success. I think that is gaining credibility with a lot of members of the Police Authority. Q8 Tom Brake: How extensively does the Commissioner believe he should appoint his senior management team? What is the scale of it? Are we talking of 10, 20 or 50 officers? Mr Godwin: It would be at the ACPO level within the Met which is the only one he does not appoint at the moment and that would be about 30 officers. Mr Malthouse: Obviously, the Commissioner, the Mayor and I have discussed this on a number of occasions and there is not a cigarette paper between us. We believe there should be a reversal of the current situation. The Authority still has a role because obviously if a vacancy arises in the last six months of a Commissionership we must ensure that whoever is appointed is able to serve any succeeding Commissioner competently and all the rest of it. But fundamentally if the Mayor is holding the Commissioner to account he must allow him to choose the team that will enable him to succeed on advice from the Authority. In a command organisation like the Metropolitan Police Service it is very important that officers look to their commanding officer first rather than an outside body; and, to be honest with you, we saw the results of the previous appointments regime under the previous Commissioner. Q9 Tom Brake: Mr Godwin, in a scenario where the Commissioner appoints or selects the 30 top-ranking officers how would the Met go about addressing some of the longstanding issues in terms of gender and ethnic balance and making sure that those officers are truly representative of London's communities as far as possible? How would those sorts of issues be addressed if one person was now responsible for appointing the top tier of officers? Mr Godwin: It would be one person in consultation with the Police Authority,
but additionally the one thing we are very clear about is that the Police
Service should be accountable to police authorities and others in terms of the
democratic process so we are still accountable for the choices and decisions we
take. We are committed to creating a
representative workforce in the Metropolitan Police to serve Londoners. That is one of our diversity strategies which
is part of the control set by the Commissioner.
We shall be working to get that right.
Obviously, we shall be picking the best candidate for the job but we are
very conscious about making sure we have systems in place to allow progression
of all members of the community in Q10 Mr Clappison: It appears that there are far more ethnic minority officers in the junior ranks of the police than there were, say, 20 or 30 years ago. It would be a good thing generally if we saw more of them progressing into leadership roles, would it not? Mr Malthouse: Absolutely. The present BME representation in the force is the highest it has ever been. Obviously, the Metropolitan Police is a long service organisation. If you go to one of the commendation ceremonies that hand out medals for 22 years' service you will notice that all the men who get up on stage are huge because 22 years ago there was a height requirement to join the service. It will take time for those characteristics to work their way through, but we see some very encouraging signs and strong promotion prospects coming through. Mr Godwin: There are still things that we need to do. We have done some work recently in terms of preparation for the selection processes, informal networks, et cetera. When you are part of a minority element within the Police Service sometimes it is harder to gain access to that informal network so we have to replace it with something else to assist in terms of bringing people through as quickly as we can. That is part of the current diversity strategy we have negotiated with the Police Authority and other staff associations that we are working through at the moment. Q11 Mr Winnick: The Met has hardly been out of the news in the past two or three years for all kinds of reasons, not necessarily for its work in combating criminality as it does day in day out. What is morale like? Mr Godwin: Morale is very good. We have staff surveys that we monitor regularly and we have a very high return in the sense of people feeling valued in the job, that they make a difference, et cetera. Whilst at the time it did not feel like it, some six years ago when we had significant recruitment into the serious crime directorates and counter-terrorism units in the boroughs we had a very young workforce. As a result we now benefit from the fact that we have a very young in-service workforce. Morale is high. We have one of the lowest sickness rates. There have been some challenges around single patrol and changing working practices which is the subject of ongoing dialogue with officers but that is now embedding and being pushed through. Q12 Mr Winnick: So it is a happy ship from to bottom, if that is the right expression? Mr Godwin: In addition, we have not been in the press so much recently. That is something of which we have been very conscious in the past, and we are very keen to focus on our core job which is keeping Londoners safe. Q13 Mr Winnick: The Prime Minister recently referred to a target whereby neighbourhood police officers would spend at least 80% of their time on the beat. Is that possible? Mr Godwin: Yes is the answer to that. Q14 Mr Winnick: Is it being done? What is the percentage at the moment? Mr Godwin: We monitor our Safer Neighbourhoods Teams' patrol time and time on the
beat. We have very strict rules in Q15 Tom Brake: Mr Godwin, how does that sit with the fact that you are supposed to have only one target which I believe is customer satisfaction? Mr Godwin: There is one overriding target for the Police Service, which is confidence in the local police target. It is not just confidence in the police but police and local authorities, so it adds a new dynamic, and all the rest of it are subordinate indicators that support the ambition. We have just had the Rounded Assessment which brings in protection from harm, confidence and satisfaction as well as local policing, so there are a range of indicators that come underneath it. Most of these are promises we have to keep, which we accept. We do not believe that a police service would naturally have only one target and would ignore all the other management information and I do not believe that any Police Authority would let them do so, but we regard the setting of those targets locally as a delegated responsibility. Q16 Bob
Russell: Mr Godwin, has the Metropolitan
Police stopped nicking police officers from Mr Godwin: You have got me on that one. If police officers from Q17 Bob
Russell: You deliberately misunderstand
me. I am talking about the Met
recruiting Mr Godwin: I am a straightforward cop and it is easier to say, "nicking". At the moment our recruiting is slowing down. We have a very low wastage rate ,which is
another good thing for us in terms of retaining our experience. We had a period during which we had a very
young workforce; we recruited 3,500 probationers a year, which meant that at
any given time we had 7,000 probationers on the streets, in the boroughs, and
we needed to encourage people to come back.
We had been a net exporter of senior experienced cops before that mainly
because they were attracted by cheaper housing, et cetera in Q18 Bob
Russell: I may return to that via a
Parliamentary Question. On Monday of
last week The Times reported that
Kent Police had become the first force to publicise on its website the results
of selected cases from magistrates' courts across the force area. The cases are based on what police chiefs say
are key issues identified by the public, including antisocial behaviour,
speeding, drink driving and criminal damage.
Are there any plans by the Met to replicate what Mr Godwin: We are putting on our website court outcomes and all the rest of it. There is a challenge in that across the country there is variation in terms of trial timeliness. In some cases one can have a nine-month delay between arrest and trial date, so getting a result for a case of grievous bodily harm can be somewhat troublesome because it takes some time to get there, but we are now putting outcomes on our website in terms of arrest et cetera. Q19 Bob Russell: Therefore, is Kent Police incorrect in saying they were the first in the country to do it? Mr Godwin: They probably were the first but the increase in information available on websites is being driven by the Home Office. Q20 Bob Russell: How much of what is promised in the Policing Pledge is the Metropolitan Police already delivering consistently? Mr Godwin: The vast majority. We had a fair assessment from HM Inspectorate in terms of the Pledge. Our timeliness in terms of response is now the best it has been for a very long time. We are hitting targets like answering the telephones within 10 seconds et cetera, but response times have been improving with new response models. One other thing we have introduced is an appointments crew, et cetera. In terms of connectivity we already had the Safer Neighbourhoods Programme and regular citizens' panels. Therefore, some of the stuff in the Pledge we were already doing and in that sense we are meeting it. We have started a mystery shopping piece because sometimes things can be advertised but not go ahead, so we send mystery shoppers just to make sure they are happening. Q21 Bob Russell: I thank you for that very full answer. What is the process for monitoring whether or not the force is meeting those targets? Mr Godwin: We have something called Q22 Bob Russell: Very comprehensive activity is taking place and again I thank you for that very full answer, but are there any areas that you consider are causing or will cause a particular challenge? Mr Godwin: One of our biggest challenges is to make sure we have sufficient capacity to meet our IMS call demands; that is, immediate and soonest calls. In terms of emergency calls often we measure just how quickly we get there as opposed to what we do when we arrive. Q23 Bob Russell: What is meant by "capacity"? Mr Godwin: One of the biggest challenges we have is to make sure we have sufficient officers at high periods of demand and at the same time maintain structure levels elsewhere. A lot of work has been done in our territorial policing to change that which is why we are now achieving our targets. Q24 Mrs Dean: Mr Malthouse, Bob Purkiss resigned as an independent panel member of the Race and Faith Inquiry because he said the Conservatives had been trying to prevent it from making critical findings. How do you respond to that allegation? Mr Malthouse: I found that rather odd. I spoke to him and he did not say that to me; and it is certainly not the case that we have touched a single word of the report which is now in draft and is with the remaining members of the committee for them to push it out. He appeared to imply that there was a problem with staff at the Police Authority compiling the report. I found it rather odd that it took him 12 months to come to that conclusion given that the process for the production of the report was agreed right at the outset, so we are sorry to lose him but three other members of the panel, two of whom are independent - the chair is an independent member of the Police Authority - continue their work. Q25 Mrs Dean: What reason did he give to you for resigning? Mr Malthouse: Bob said he was unhappy with the process and the fact that the Police Authority would be producing the report which I told him had been clear from the outset. I did not quite understand what the implication was, but sadly he decided to take his ball home. Q26 Tom Brake: He stated that his concern was that attempts would be made to stop the report making critical findings. Are you saying there is absolutely no truth in that? Mr Malthouse: There is no truth in that whatsoever. There have been no conversations about specific findings or anything to do with the report. In many ways to draw that conclusion cuts at the credibility of the other two independent members of the panel who I am sure would jump up and down if there were a problem. Q27 Tom
Brake: Perhaps that is something we need to
pursue with the Guardian at a later
date. In October 2008 the Metropolitan
Black Police Association threatened to put advertisements in the national press
recommending that black and Asian recruits should not join the Mr Malthouse: I had an extremely good, productive relationship with the Met BPA before the boycott. We did not engage during the boycott but the moment they lifted it there was a re-engagement and we have had a couple of productive, useful meetings since. We are looking at ways in which we can work with the Association closely on our common and shared aims. Mr Godwin: It was a sad day that the Met BPA as part of the Met family chose
to take that action. Since then we have
been working with them. For me, the
greatest sadness is that the Met BPA does a lot more than merely represent
individuals in terms of specific cases, which is the bit that gets a lot of
airtime in terms of media coverage, et cetera; it works with young people in
inner city estates, encouraging them to come forward as young leaders and
engage with the police around criminality and what causes concerns. Where we have problems in relation to knife
crime or homicides BPA members will try to encourage people to come forward and
support the investigation. The emphasis
was on their other area of activity which was the support of individuals with
grievances against the Metropolitan Police.
As a result, in their representation of individuals that other good work
got missed. Since then a lot of water
has passed under the bridge. We have had
very good conversation. I believe I have
a very good relationship with the executive of the MBPA in talking about how we
can work in a collaborative way to achieve our common ambition which is to have
a police service in Q28 Tom Brake: Is it your long-term ambition there is no need for a BPA or will that always be there? Mr Godwin: There is always a need for connectivity and communication where you
respect differences and understand the needs of different communities and
backgrounds. at the moment having the staff associations has added to
rather than detracted from that. There
have been some challenges along the way, but currently having a Muslim Police
Association is very useful and helpful in understanding and working with those
communities in Mr Malthouse: Oddly enough, I had a meeting with all the staff associations only last week. We discussed the idea that, as you imply, our objective should be that over time they become social clubs because what they do should in theory be embedded in the mainstream work of the Metropolitan Police. There was a general view that that should be an aspiration, albeit there is a lot of work to get there. Q29 Chair: It remains a worry that there are so few black and Asian officers
at the highest levels of the Met, whereas if you look outside Mr Godwin: He was a Deputy Assistant Commissioner in Q30 Chair: What is a commander's salary at the moment? Mr Godwin: It is £90,000-odd. Q31 Chair: The salary of the chief constable of Leicestershire, say, would be what? Mr Godwin: The salary of an assistant chief constable, which is a rank comparable with that of commander, would be £10,000 or £15,000 on top of that. As a result, getting people to come in sideways in terms of a transfer is a challenge at that level. It evens out. For a deputy assistant commissioner and assistant commissioner based on the assessment of risk that they carry it comes out at the level of chief constables of Greater Manchester and places like that. Therefore, at those levels you can bring people in, but it is about the time taken to get people through the system. Mr Malthouse: On gender balance we have appointed the first ever female assistant commissioner in the Metropolitan Police, Cressida Dick, and have a number of female DACs who have been recently appointed. Therefore, we are doing reasonably well in gender balance. Q32 Bob Russell: The Metropolitan Police has the national lead in several areas of policing with funding from the Government. Is that ring-fenced? Mr Godwin: The grant funds are ring-fenced. Therefore, where we get CT grant funding it goes to CT activity and we are accountable to the Home Office and OST for how we use that funding. Q33 Bob Russell: Mr Malthouse, do you have sufficient funding to do that national work as opposed to the Met's work on those lead items? Mr Malthouse: You are pressing on a sore point. The specific grants are ring-fenced, but our mainstream grant from the Mayor is not ring-fenced, according to the Home Office, so a certain amount of cross-subsidy is required for some of the national functions because we do not believe we get full funding from the Home Office. Q34 Bob Russell: You are ahead of me because my next question is this: given that the Met, along with every other force, expects that it will have to make significant spending cuts and it has a national obligation for which it has Government funding, which cannot go out, can Metropolitan money go into the national work you have to do, and how will you guarantee that day-to-day policing will not suffer as a consequence? Mr Malthouse: It is a good point and obviously one on which the Commissioner is in discussion with the Home Office constantly. One of the things we try to highlight to the Government is that when making their spending decisions they should bear in mind the risks to which they expose the country by the decisions they take. It is no secret that in the Metropolitan Police budget this year we have had to transfer about £4 million of extra funding into protection. We have done that to maintain the service and do what we need to do. Our view is that money should come from central Government but they have got us, if you like, in that we have to deliver the service and want to make sure we handle the risk. We would like to have a fair financing settlement, but at the moment we do not feel we get one. Q35 Bob Russell: Without putting words into your mouth, if this Committee were to make a recommendation it should be along the lines that the Government gives you ring-fenced money for the national work you have to do, but when that funding falls short of what you have to do you have to raid Londoners' police money in the form of the Metropolitan Police budget to pay for the national policing? Mr Malthouse: That is right. Q36 Bob Russell: You believe that is unfair and you would wish the Committee to draw that to the attention of Government? Mr Malthouse: Absolutely. National functions should be funded nationally and the rest should be left for mainstream delivery. Part of the issue is that those national functions are vitally important but a reflection of their success is when nothing happens, so it is quite hard for the public to appreciate that that is money well spent on their behalf. Q37 Bob
Russell: I recognise that point. Mr Godwin, how does it impact on Mr Godwin: At the moment the amount of money spent on some of the things we
have talked about, dedicated security posts and protection, is a small sum but
naturally that could be used to provide police officers to police the
streets. Sometimes it is very hard to
identify what are the national bits and what are the Q38 Chair: It is not just that, is it?
There is also the policing of Mr Godwin: Naturally, at the time it was a concern to us. Led by Cressida Dick and the Serious Crime Directorate, what we have done is amalgamate some of the other units previously engaged in clubs and vice, et cetera, and as a result created a human trafficking unit. Sometimes the Home Office provides pump priming to set up a specific initiative. Naturally, that initiative comes to a conclusion and then we have to build it into the mainstream budget and look at the value of it, how much we need to put into it and what the priority is. We work with the Police Authority and naturally we would like the funding to continue forever, but I think we are fairly pragmatic in the current climate. Q39 Tom
Brake: It has been estimated by the Labour
Party, admittedly not an independent source, that you might be 500 officers
down in Mr Godwin: The current trajectory looking forward - obviously, it still awaits
Q40 Tom Brake: To summarise it, you are saying that in terms of frontline uniformed officers - the sort of people the public see on the streets - you are confident there will be no dip in those numbers? Mr Godwin: Yes, in 2010/11 in terms of operational visibility. We have one of the highest visibilities in the country. One thing we have done in the past four years is to go from about 600 to over 3,000 Metropolitan Special Constables, so our visibility should be increasing in this period, especially on Friday and Saturday nights, but in terms of operational footfall we believe that this budget balances for us. Q41 Mr Winnick: Mr Godwin, I turn to corruption. Have all the rotten apples been weeded out? Mr Godwin: If you have an organisation of 55,000 there will always be rotten apples in it; there will be people who for whatever reason will succumb to criminal behaviour. We have a dedicated command which is there purely to hunt out such people and that command continues today. I believe that in the past 12 or 18 months there have been 26 criminal convictions involving police officers. I can confirm that if you need the actual figure. Forty per cent of allegations of serious level corruption that we receive relate to criminal organisations trying to access our databases. Q42 Mr Winnick: Do you take the view that the process of weeding out corruption is robust? I do not expect you to say "no", but for the record. Mr Godwin: Yes, I do believe it to be robust. One other extremely positive aspect is that the majority of that corruption is identified by other police officers. Mr Malthouse: I reassure you that we intend to make it robust because over the next 12 months the Police Authority will undertake formal scrutiny of the systems and structure around corruption. Q43 Mrs Dean: Mr Malthouse, how does the regime in the new Heron unit at Feltham differ from the provision for other young offender institutions? Mr Malthouse: As to the Daedalus Project, the Heron unit is rapidly becoming one of the most valuable things to be delivered under this mayoralty. It is based on a relatively simple idea to try to break the academy of crime effect one often finds in prisons and YOIs. We separate out young men who are either in the last three months of their stay or show a particular desire to change the way they live and give them a different regime. The regime has a number of characteristics. It is much more workmanlike so that unlike everybody else at Feltham individuals wash their own clothes, prepare their own food, receive a lot more assistance with education and training and have conversations about opportunities when they leave. In particular each gets an individual called a resettlement broker who works with them while they are in Feltham and for as long as it takes afterwards to make sure they get into employment or training and can deal with housing. They might need some help around their families. All of those issues are ironed out for them. We believe it is a good investment because previously we just locked up 78% of them again in the following 12 months. At the moment about 53 boys have either passed through the unit or are in the unit and to date not a single one has re-offended. Those are small numbers. We want to put about 300 through in the next couple of years, but we shall see where we get to. What is pleasing is that quite a lot of people are joining the coalition. Large companies like Cisco and Bovis Lend Lease now offer job opportunities for people leaving the unit, and in the next few days our first alumnus will be interviewing for a place at university. Therefore, we are seeing some early signs that it may be a way forward. Q44 Mrs Dean: How much more expensive is it to deliver it? Mr Malthouse: It is much cheaper for two reasons: first, we are investing upfront rather than spending money on locking them up again; second, the deal we have done with the organisation that takes the bulk of the money and provides the resettlement brokers means that they receive the bulk of the payment only once the young man has been in employment for six months. Therefore, they are paid by results. If they do not achieve the results we want to see they will not be paid, so the taxpayer gets a win-win. Mr Godwin: Perhaps I may point out in support of Daedalus that a challenge is
coming as reflected in the report of the Justice Select Committee, namely the
current programme is linked to another project called Diamond which looks at
short sentence prisoners where there is a very high rate of recidivism in a
different way to return them into communities and support them in that
transition. The challenge faced by Q45 Mr
Clappison: In various settings the Committee
has come across the very sad phenomenon of honour crime. Last week we heard evidence that three police
forces in Mr Malthouse: We could have a look at it.
I am aware that in Mr Godwin: In terms of the specific headline, we have looked at whether we should have our own honour-based violence hotline. We have also been looking with other forces at whether there should be one for the South East. We have now established a very good national domestic violence helpline with good training that covers honour-based violence, because often the offenders and victims are within a family environment. Therefore, rather than have a plethora of different numbers and contacts we have taken the view that that national DV helpline should be able to support the work. Q46 Mr Clappison: Do you think that can be adapted so that people who might come within that category understand that it is there for them as well? Mr Godwin: Yes. There is a need to connect to other units and third sectors that can help locally or whatever. I believe the national DV helpline is the way we should go but we will constantly review that. Q47 Mr Clappison: I refer now to the stop and search powers under section 44 of the Terrorism Act. The latest figures for July to September 2009 show that the Met has halved the number of stop and searches carried out. How has that reduction in the use of the stop and search power affected your broader counter-terrorism strategy, if at all? Mr Godwin: As is oft reported, previously we had a pan-London blanket authority which was renewed every 28 days for the use of section 44. Following the review of Lord Carlile and others, they pointed out that they did not think that was appropriate, we reviewed that and agreed. As a result, led by John Yates as the Assistant Commissioner for special operations we have looked at the intelligence and where the risk sites are and have had negotiations with local communities as well as local borough commands about where it is felt section 44 should most appropriately be used. As a result there are specific locations which, based on our information and intelligence, are higher risk areas of terrorist activity where we now authorise the use of section 44. Undoubtedly that has reduced the numbers of stops and searches conducted under that power. Additionally, we put a lot of information out about photography where section 44 was being used when it should have been section 43. As a result we see the stops falling. Does it mean that in terms of protective capability - it is about making it more difficult or deterring surveillance and preparation as well as the acts themselves - we are still doing it? Yes. We believe it provides sufficient cover. Q48 Mr Clappison: You mentioned photography about which we have seen some publicity. Are you addressing the sorts of concerns raised in those reports? Mr Godwin: Yes, we are. Obviously tourists who come to London want to take photographs of iconic buildings and all the rest of it, but at the same time we have to be alive to the fact there is a significant level of threat and preparatory surveillance is undertaken by people, but it is about having reasonable grounds to suspect before we do it, not just a blanket approach. Q49 Mr Clappison: What is happening with arrests as a result of stop and search powers under section 44 of the Terrorism Act? Mr Godwin: Obviously, section 44 is a prevent piece rather than enforcement piece, so arrests are fairly low in number, but one of the things we pick up are arrests as a result criminality that emerge from section 44. Q50 Mr Clappison: Those are other types of criminality not related to terrorism? Mr Godwin: Other types of criminality that are discovered at the time, but the number of arrests is very low. Q51 Chair: On stop and search, do you acknowledge that there is still a
disproportionate number of black people being stopped and searched on the
streets of Mr Godwin: Yes. The report of the
Equality and Human Rights Commission on stop and search was received at Q52 Mrs
Dean: Mr Godwin, figures published on your
website show a 2.4% fall in overall crime in Mr Godwin: Yes. One of the biggest challenges facing anyone especially over a longitudinal study is the many differences and definitions that have changed over time. It is now very difficult to compare previous data with current data. I believe that is a loss in terms of trend. The British Crime Survey has been fairly standard throughout and as a result is an indicator but it is weakened on the basis it does not include young people. It has now been corrected but it does not have young people in the long-term data. I believe that anyone trying to draw conclusions over a 20 to 25-year period will face a challenge. Post a new government, whatever it may be, we would welcome a review of how we do that. There is a disconnect between the way the Home Office or police record and define crime and how the criminal justice system interprets the same activity. As a result, we will record something as grievous bodily harm but we will charge it as a common assault which means it appears we are not convicting anybody of GBH when in reality they are being convicted of common assault or ABH. That is a challenge which the Office for Criminal Justice Reform and MoJ have just picked up and we will be working with them. Q53 Mrs Dean: Are there any types of crime that give you cause for concern at the moment? Mr Godwin: All of them give me cause for concern. Obviously the biggest challenge for us has been youth violence in the recent past. We went through a period when 30 teenagers were killed in a year and as a result we put a lot of operational activity into something called Blunt 2. Teenage homicide this year is running at 11 cases, so there has been a significant reduction, but we need to be alive to the fact that knife crime and robbery will always be a challenge in the street scene in a number of our boroughs. I looked at the data over the past five years and all crimes bar rape had been falling. Rape gives us concern. We welcome Baroness Stern's report in terms of looking at rape in terms that go wider than purely attrition and conviction. Q54 Chair: What about gun crime? That
seems to be rising in Mr Godwin: I have been operating in the crime world in Q55 Chair: On the question of new technology, last year the Committee
recommended that each member of the police force in the country should have a
handheld computer of this kind,
not necessarily this make. How are we doing in Mr Godwin: I do not have to hand the number deployed, but in the region of 3,000 to 4,000 have been issued. Q56 Chair: What is the percentage? Mr Godwin: As a percentage of the operational capacity in boroughs it would be 10% of the overall police numbers, but in terms of operational officers on the street not having to go back it would equate to something like 30%. Q57 Chair: Do you have a target for when everyone might have one? Mr Godwin: Not everyone will have one because there are lots of BlackBerries
floating about as well, which is a different scheme for senior officers, but in
terms of the Q58 Chair: That would be very helpful.
Mr Malthouse, we are just completing our inquiry into the Mr Malthouse: Yes. Obviously we monitor complaints generally, but one of the discussions we are having with the Commissioner is around front counters generally and the service that the public receive when they either complain or come to report various crimes. Quite a lot of effort goes into improving first touch response to things like complaints as well as a number of other services. Chair: Mr Godwin and Mr Malthouse, we know that you are very busy people. We are grateful to you for coming here today. |