Examination of Witnesses (Questions 110-147)
CHIEF CONSTABLE
MATT BAGGOTT
CBE QPM, ASSISTANT CHIEF
CONSTABLE DREW
HARRIS AND
DEPUTY CHIEF
CONSTABLE JUDITH
GILLESPIE
25 JANUARY 2010
Q110 Chairman: Chief Constable, could
I welcome you most warmly. We are delighted to see you. We are
delighted that you have brought Deputy Chief Constable Judith
Gillespie and Assistant Chief Constable Drew Harris, both of whom
we know from previous sessions. We are grateful for the assistance
they have given in the past. We had many meetings, both public
and private, with Sir Hugh and developed a very constructive relationship
with him and hope to be able to do the same with you, although
this Committee's life, of course, is very limited. Thank you for
coming this afternoon. We are making as our final report to Parliament
an assessment of devolution since 2005, obviously focusing very
much on the controversial issue of the devolution of policing
and justice. Just by way of introduction, perhaps you could tell
us how you are settling in, what advice Sir Hugh gave you when
you took over and how you have defined your priorities in your
new role.
Chief Constable Baggott:
That is very kind. Thank you very much indeed for that very warm
welcome. I genuinely look forward to working with the Committee
over the forthcoming months, and hopefully years as well. It is
really good to be here. I knew it would be a testing and interesting
job as Chief Constable, and both of those are true, but it is
an enormous privilege. I have taken every opportunity to say what
a privilege it is to be wearing a green uniform, to be taking
forward the very rich and courageous legacy of colleagues from
the RUC who are still with us, but also having a chance to shape
PSNI on the back of some incredibly effective work by my predecessor,
Sir Hugh, and also colleagues who are sitting with me. Every day
that goes by I feel more proud to be here and more privileged
to be in the position I am in. I mean that genuinely. Over the
last four months I have particularly enjoyed many private and
quiet conversations with people, sometimes in their front rooms,
sometimes in community groups, sometimes in big meetings, District
Policing Partnerships and with the Policing Board, and I genuinely
think there is a hunger for something that will be truly unique
in the world around the role of policing and what policing can
deliver across communities and across divides. In spite of the
recent change in the security situation and the tragedies that
have befallen my colleagues, particularly Peader Heffron in the
past few weeks, I remain very optimistic because of the energy
and overwhelming consent and reassurance that the PSNI has been
given, particularly at very local level within the communities
that really matter. I think Sir Hugh's advice to me would be "listen".
When I first arrived I was asked the question, "What do you
know about Northern Ireland to make you fit to be the Chief here?"
and my answer to that was, "Probably not a lot, but I know
a lot of people who do know the answers". There is an enormous
amount of expertise and advice, some of which has come to me very
quietly, very privately, from within the PSNI itself, sometimes
it has come from communities and sometimes it has come from politicians,
but I know there is an enormous amount of advice which has been
freely and willingly given and I really do welcome and respect
that. I will make my mistakes, but if I make mistakes, which I
will and already have done, it will not be through lack of integrity
in trying to do the right thing, it will be simply because maybe
I have not listened hard enough and quick enough to understand
how to present things. In terms of where we are going, I think
we are in an enormously exciting time of change, not just because
of the whole debate around devolution, I will leave that to one
side, but as the PSNI I would probably say that to some degree
now that PSNI is established and there is a high degree of confidence
in what we stand for and what we are doing, the shackles are being
released. By "shackles", what I mean is being tied to
a fixed establishment, for example, of 7,500, being able to shape
an organisation of the right people in the right place so that
we can, if you like, employ different skills at different parts
of the organisation which may not need policing skills and so
liberate money. We have a policing plan that the Policing Board
have embraced, which I believe very strongly is focusing on the
right things around tackling the issues that really develop confidence:
serious harm; personal policing; the really consistent relationship
building policing that people yearn for and have a hunger for;
and deal with the things that matter for the vast majority in
their daily lives, such as alcohol abuse, antisocial behaviour,
road safety, get the basics absolutely right. None of that takes
away from the policing with the community plan which I think has
delivered terrific progress around empowerment, problem solving,
partnership and accountability. All of those are very important.
Now we have got the freedom and some of the shackles are coming
off our job is to absolutely deliver a PSNI identity and a PSNI
standard of the things that absolutely matter, and the policing
plan has been shaped to do that. I think the policing plan has
some quite radical things built into it already, or will post-April.
For example, coming off a single crime reduction target when we
know that less than half of the people here report crime in the
first place we shall be encouraging greater accessibility to policing
and greater conversation. If that means we have to record more
crime then we should embrace that. To some degree the targets
we have had have not necessarily been about encouraging the relationship
and the activity, and that is changing. This year, through the
survey work, we will have a target to increase crime recording
and reporting rather than decrease numbers. There is an interesting
change in direction around the plan which is a very clear mandate.
There have been two words said to me that I did not expect in
the conversations that I have had, but I absolutely welcome. From
all sides of the community people have said to me, "Many
of us feel quite inspired by what your colleagues are doing locally".
Individual people are doing great things and stepping out from
the traditional role of policing and having those conversations.
I did not expect to hear the word "inspirational" being
used, but people have said to me, "We want the PSNI to be
truly inspirational in the integrity of the uniform". That
was a very interesting one for me. That is about taking forward
the things we are doing well already but making them more consistent.
Secondly, people have said to me, "We would like to have
more of an identity as the PSNI". I have asked people what
they mean by that and what they say is, "An identity is something
people instinctively know" and the word people kept saying
was "personal". "Deal with the serious crime, deal
with security, deal with drug dealing, deal with ATM thefts. They
are the things we shouldn't be asking you to deal with, you should
be dealing with them as a matter of course because these are the
things that cause great misery. Deal with child protection, deal
with the things we shouldn't have to ask you for and be better
and better at that and benchmark yourself against the best".
The identity bit is, "Get as personal as you can in the 500,000
moments of truth you deal with every year, which are the incidents".
There are two phrases we have introduced which are not in the
policing plan. One is, "If it doesn't feel good it probably
is not and you need to change your structure and processes"
and, "If you think you are being radical, you are probably
not in changing some of that". Finally, Chairman, there are
dilemmas ahead. We will tackle the serious harm, the personal
and the local concerns, and we will become more consistent on
that. The other thing we have to bear in mind is that ultimately
value for money and, in relation to the Policing Board, holding
ourselves even more accountable for securing effective policing
in a time of recession is something that we have to have a more
business edge to do. I do not mean that we just transfer commercial
disciplines straight into what we do because there are differences
between the two. I think our share price is confidence as opposed
to finance. We are being very self-critical now in looking at
some key functions, for example how we manage transport, to see
whether we have got money tied up in ineffective processes and
bureaucracy that quite rightly we should be using either to invest
back into operational policing or preparing ourselves for—whether
devolution takes place or not—an economic climate which
is likely to be more restrained into the future.
Q111 Chairman: Thank you very much
indeed for that. That is a very encouraging opening statement,
for which we are grateful. Before I bring in colleagues, could
I just make one point. You referred to Constable Heffron and we
were all appalled by that ghastly crime and would ask that you
convey the good wishes of the Committee to him when you next communicate
with him. I understand he is making a slow but good recovery.
He has our prayers and good wishes.
Chief Constable Baggott: Thank
you, Chairman. I shall make sure I pass that on to both Peader
and his family.
Chairman: Thank you very much indeed.
Q112 David Simpson: Can I also put
on record our appreciation for all the work that the PSNI do.
It is a job like our job, Chairman, where you will never, ever
reach public expectation no matter what you do. Certainly being
a politician today you will not. I would like to pass on my thoughts
and prayers to the Constable and his family. I had the privilege
at Christmas time of visiting Stephen Carroll's home to visit
Kate again in Banbridge. It was not a good day for her, that particular
day, and she was definitely feeling very low. However, she has
been a remarkable lady through all of that and the recent times
of the two soldiers as well. In relation to policing and justice,
we know there is a lot of heavy discussion going on today and
everybody talks about this pinnacle time in Northern Ireland,
but I think we have a pinnacle time every day of the week in Northern
Ireland. The public and media are certainly concentrating on it.
In relation to policing and justice, what impact, if and when
it is devolved, will the policing and justice powers in Northern
Ireland have on your operations? Secondly, the financial package
that was proposed by the Prime Minister, do you believe that is
satisfactory?
Chief Constable Baggott: Thank
you very much. I will start with the last one first. I think the
financial package is satisfactory and I have been very clear about
that publicly. It gives us space and stability to make some of
the changes we need to make in the way we work. So streamlining
the bureaucracy, making the changes to the criminal justice system
we need to make, giving police officers more discretion, it gives
us space to do that. It also gives me clarity around what the
operational budget will be rather than having to worry about hearing
loss and pensions. The other part of it, which I think is a very
important guarantee particularly in the changing security situation,
is access to the Security Fund and to the Treasury. I would certainly
seek to keep that open so that if we do have problems or difficulties
we take a pragmatic view of the Security Fund itself. I should
say that none of the financial stability that we seek to have
takes away from the increased collaboration that we have with
our colleagues in the Garda. There is some very important work
being done taken forward by my Deputy at the moment on that. Enhancing
collaboration in our working with other agencies too carries on
regardless. Yes, I do think the financial stability is very important.
Secondly, devolution will make the conversation more local about
partnership and about how do you reduce crime in neighbourhoods.
I have always been a greater believer that policing is so much
more than law enforcement. Policing is security; security is health;
policing is education. On the work I have done on neighbourhood
policing nationally there have been over 40 connections between
good policing and good security linked into health, education,
quality of life, economic regeneration. I think those debates
are best had here. I do believe that with devolution will come
a greater understanding and a greater conversation, and some dilemmas
about where do we spend the money in the future but that still
has to be worked through. I do believe those conversations need
to take place very much locally. I am a supporter of devolution.
I think we will need some clarity coming out on the role of the
Policing Board. I do believe that where a lot of things that happen
at the moment may be duplicated for very good historical reasons,
there will need to be a clearing of the landscape. We sat this
morning at an audit and risk meeting. Who now audits me against
the standards and the plan? Is it going to be the Policing Board?
Who exercises due diligence and scrutiny? There are big debates
to be had still but, for me, as Chief reporting to the Policing
Board in their role to secure effective policing, I see that conversation
very much being focused on my accountability to the Policing Board.
Q113 David Simpson: Apart from the
finance and the political decision to go ahead with it, do you
envisage any other obstacles?
Chief Constable Baggott: I do
not, other than an understanding of what is operational responsibility
and operational independence. We do need to have a very clear
understanding that Ministry of Justice will be responsible for
partnership, for the working of the processes, dealing with re-offending,
for some degree of conversation with me about the money and the
prioritisation with the Assembly, but I do firmly believe that
we still need a tripartite between the Policing Board, the Assembly
and an operationally responsible Chief and Chief Officer's team
who can cross the political divide if necessary. I do believe
that the policing plan is representing that very well. My job
is absolutely to reduce harm, to deal with the serious and to
deliver local policing completely objectively based on the evidence
of what needs to be done rather than being swayed by politics
be they local or national.
Q114 Stephen Pound: You will be aware
that a lot of people from different elements are talking about
the protocol for the post-devolution architecture and some people
are saying that in effect this recasts Patten. Did you want to
say anything on the record about that because this is a subject
that a number of us are being individually lobbied about?
Chief Constable Baggott: I think
it is the emerging picture. It is something that very much has
to be worked out between political parties. My concern would be
that, firstly, we need to maintain and defend the operational
independence of the Chief Constable to make decisions based on
harm and need, but also to make sure we have clarity about the
role of the Policing Board and external scrutiny. The conversations
around what makes effective policing need to be had in probably
one place, albeit that the financing of that and the relationship
in partnership with health, education and the justice process
itself needs to be managed from the Assembly. We do need to have
clarity so that we do not get into confused conversations about
who is responsible and accountable for what.
Q115 Stephen Pound: Is the protocol
publicly available?
Chief Constable Baggott: I do
not believe it is.
Q116 Rosie Cooper: Could I ask you
for your current assessment of the threat by republican and other
terrorist groups currently?
Chief Constable Baggott: Certainly,
and if it is okay I will invite my colleagues to come in as well.
From my perspective it is severe. That is an obvious thing to
say, but we have had a variety of attacks on the very nature of
the institutions that will lead us into devolution and police:
a bomb attack outside the Policing Board; landmines; and even
last night a firebomb attack on a police station where colleagues
are trying to bridge the divide by increasing their personal policing;
the attack on my colleague, Peader Heffron, because he is a Catholic,
because he is involved in Gaelic. These are very real attacks
on the future of peace. Their nature and variety is of great concern,
as is the willingness to engage in this when the vast majority
of people are saying, "Our priorities", and it is interesting
that the priorities of District Policing Partnerships and every
survey says, "What we want is stability. What we want is
personal policing. We want to deal with drugs and antisocial behaviour"
and actually the political structure above that is something that
will be managed in a different place. What we want is local policing
of the people by people like Peader Heffron. It is severe and
it is concerning, but we are putting an enormous effort into challenging
it. I would invite Drew to say a few words around this as well.
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
Just on the statistics, in 2008 there were 15 significant incidents
that we would attribute to dissident republicans and in 2009 there
were 22. The difference is not only numerical but also the increase
in ambition and also the increase in intensity and scale of the
attacks. You do not need to be reminded of the murder of Constable
Stephen Carroll or the murders of sappers Azimkar and Quinsey
in March of last year. We have seen that pattern carry on in terms
of the attempted murder of police officers at Forkhill, the attack
on the Policing Board and, indeed, most recently the attack on
Constable Peader Heffron. The threat sits at "severe".
It was increased to "severe" in February of last year
and that is very properly where it is in that attacks can be viewed
as being highly likely. The Police Service remains the most prominent
and likely target for attack and our officers are very much aware
of that. We take a lot of steps to make sure they are properly
briefed, receive the proper equipment and proper training with
which to cope with this threat. My own department, the Crime Operations
Department, works very closely with the Security Service but also
very closely with An Garda Síochána and we have
had a number of very successful operations throughout the year.
Some of the successes that we have do not really make it into
the public domain, or if they do it is in quite an oblique fashion
in terms of people charged for other crimes who have not been
charged with acts of terrorism. There is an awful lot of activity
going on on the ground to thwart the efforts of dissident republicans
and approximately 50% of the money I would spend in my department,
of all my resources, goes on coping with the national security
threat posed by dissident republicans. In respect of loyalists,
both the UVF and UDA—mainstream UDA—have completed
major acts of decommissioning. There are still some splinter groups
out there that have not decommissioned on the loyalist side, the
South East Antrim UDA and very small groups such as the Orange
Volunteers, but a very significant amount of material has been
decommissioned by both UDA and UVF. What has to happen next is
that those organisations, in effect, decommission themselves and
start to collapse down their own structures and organisation.
That is hopefully the next step that we will see in respect of
loyalist paramilitaries.
Q117 Lady Hermon: Going back to the
Orange Volunteers, we are well aware of the really serious threat
from dissident republicans but this group, how large is it, how
dangerous is it and why have we just recently seemed to have had
a spate of threats to execute various individuals, including journalists,
who I obviously would not name? I am very concerned about the
Orange Volunteers.
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
In respect of the Orange Volunteers, it is a loose affiliation
of likeminded individuals mostly driven by sectarian hatreds and
bigotry, in effect. It is pretty much a loose coalition, almost
telephone kiosk terrorists in that they phone these warnings in.
A lot of it is, in effect, sectarian hate crime but it is directed
for political purposes. We have had success against them this
year but a threat still exists because they have an ambition to
attack others, so we do view them with some concern. We have put
work into dealing with that and have had success in terms of managing
that threat.
Q118 Mr Grogan: As the February deadline
approaches what is your assessment of the level of weaponry that
is still out there with terrorist groups, be they dissident or
otherwise? Is there a lot still out there?
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
There have been major acts of decommissioning by the main terrorist
groups, the Provisional IRA, UVF and UDA, but in effect the ceasefire
was in 1994 and a lot of this material in its widest sense has
either been dispersed and we have collected it through other means
or it has been dispersed and lost. It is very difficult to put
an estimate on what still exists out there. What is of concern
to us is that still there is the availability of firearms and
we can see that on the island of Ireland as a whole in terms of
pretty serious weaponry making its way to Dublin into the hands
of criminals there, and if it arrives in Dublin it can obviously
come through to ourselves. Obviously making sure the criminal
gangs and terrorist gangs do not get their hands on weaponry is
a long-term objective of this organisation, plus An Garda S-«ochána
and the Security Service. We do put a lot of effort into making
sure that we carry out thorough investigations as to where weapons
are being procured from. This is a European problem and we work
a lot with our colleagues in both Europol and the Serious and
Organised Crime Agency in forwarding movements of weapons. It
is a difficult problem but we are very aware that supply routes
can be opened up by criminal gangs and that we have to do all
we can to thwart that particular threat.
Q119 Mr Grogan: If I may return to
the issue of devolution. You referred to the protocol and so on,
which has not yet been published. Have you signed it off? Are
you happy with the current draft? Who would you see on non-operational
matters who you primarily have discussions with on strategy or
resources? Would it be the Policing Board or would it be the Scrutiny
Committee here?
Chief Constable Baggott: It would
be the Policing Board because it is their policing plan. They
are responsible for securing effective policing. In time I am
sure they will develop the means to hold me even more accountable
through scrutiny and audit and be part of that. I invited the
Policing Board to become more involved in the strategic management
of the PSNI, not blurring the boundaries between our accountability
to them but in terms of taking even more immediate advice around,
"Are we doing the right things? Does it feel good?"
I want to have a more inclusive approach with the Policing Board
but being absolutely secure in terms of our accountability to
the Board itself. I understand the protocol is a work in progress,
so in relation to my signing off the answer is no but, there again,
I would not necessarily be expecting to sign it off because I
am not elected, I am not a politician. To some degree the accountability
of the police is too important to be left to the police. I am
quite a firm believer in that. Later on I might give some very
strong advice about how words are defined within the protocol.
Q120 Mr Grogan: It is a tripartite
agreement, is it not, between the police and the other bodies
so you would sign it off?
Chief Constable Baggott: I am
unsighted on the current level of Policing Board involvement in
that protocol.
Q121 Mr Grogan: I think there is
a phrase in the current draft that says the Chief Constable would
be the chief adviser on police and security matters to the Minister
of Justice. Would that be a phraseology that you would be happy
with?
Chief Constable Baggott: I think
there is a role for the Chief Constable being an adviser and that
relationship is probably well managed in the word "advice"
because that is a different word from "accountability".
If the Minister of Justice wanted to take professional advice
on how well partnerships are developing, for example, and what
partnerships should be concentrating on and how to improve the
criminal justice process, and do we move to devolving some restorative
justice, then I would expect to be a professional adviser on those
matters.
Q122 David Simpson: We have a lot
of young recruits, young men and women, who never lived through
the Troubles. Obviously we have older officers who would remember
what it was like. With the level of threat and the constant reminders
of the incidents that have happened, how are the young officers
coping with that? What is the morale like?
Chief Constable Baggott: I am
going to invite Judith to come in on this in a moment because
Judith is probably better positioned to talk from knowledge. Coming
here and being here for the four months, at graduation ceremonies
and induction ceremonies where mums and dads and partners come
in for the very first day where they sign the forms, they come
together, are greeted by myself and my colleagues, I have seen
an enormous enthusiasm. The figures on recruitment are certainly
holding up and I would even anticipate a surge of good people
wanting to stand up to be counted. I think there is a difference
between words like "morale" and "commitment".
Morale is a very difficult word to pin down. I joined the Metropolitan
Police 33 years ago and I was told on my very first day that morale
was the lowest it had ever been. The word "morale" is
one we use a little bit too freely in the Police Service. If you
were to ask me, "Have you seen commitment, courage, passion
for policing?", I have seen it in huge abundance and none
of that seems to be changing.
Deputy Chief Constable Gillespie:
Thank you for the question. It is important to note that the average
age of our student officers now is a lot older than it would have
been when I joined the RUC when very often people were joining
straight from school. Of course, I joined when I was eight!
Q123 Chairman: We will expect an
invitation to your 18th birthday!
Deputy Chief Constable Gillespie:
The average age of our student officers would be in their late
twenties, 27-30, which means that they are joining with some experience
of the university of life, which I think is a very important quality
for our police officers to have to understand some of life's difficulties
when they are attending, for example, domestic violence situations,
et cetera. It is both a challenge and an opportunity that many
of those folk have not experienced the Troubles at their worst.
As the Chief Constable has said, right from the outset we give
advice on the first night that our student officers, with their
families, come in: "You are now a member of the police family
and you need to think about your habits and routines both on and
off duty, and you need to start thinking about that now".
That families' night happens some weeks before they actually come
into the organisation. We give very clear advice about what our
student officers put on their social networking sites, for example,
because we know that is an area of vulnerability, about who they
tell that they are joining the police, just thinking about the
routines they create, and also looking forward to the future and
what policing will demand of them in terms of the standards of
behaviour that this organisation expects both on and off duty.
We have also developed bespoke DVDs to educate our own officers
and staff, because it is not just police officers who are under
threat but police staff as well, in terms of what to look for
when you are checking under your vehicle, very specific advice
about the types of under-car booby traps that are available. I
would stress the fact that this is not necessarily just a challenge
for us, it is also an opportunity with people coming in with a
fresh way of thinking, looking at problems in a different way
and determined to deliver a community-based policing service.
That is an opportunity as well as a challenge.
Q124 Lady Hermon: Congratulations
to you, Mr Baggott, on your appointment as Chief Constable and
successor to Sir Hugh. Many congratulations to Judith Gillespie
as well who when she last appeared before us was not the Deputy
Chief Constable. We are always delighted to have Drew with us
in any capacity. I am moving on because time is passing and we
have a number of different topics that we want to cover. We do
appreciate the time that you have given to us against a very busy
schedule and the demanding workload that you all have. I am moving
on to organised crime. As I am something of an addict of the radio,
Radio Ulster or whatever, and that includes the Stephen Nolan
Show, I have become increasingly concerned about drugs. We
have heard about Ballymena and other towns mentioned as well.
Could I ask you first of all about human trafficking. Is that
a growing problem in Northern Ireland? Who are the women and perhaps
children who are being trafficked? Is it from Eastern Europe?
Could you enlighten the Committee on that particular area?
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
Human trafficking was first detected with the Pentameter 2 Operation.
With Pentameter 1 in Northern Ireland we uncovered no instances
of human trafficking, but that changed with Pentameter 2 in 2008
and since then we have had a steady number of cases. Indeed, the
most recent case has involved the trafficking of a child into
Northern Ireland.
Q125 Lady Hermon: For what purpose?
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
For the purpose of prostitution. The situation continues to get
more and more serious, in effect. We have had people trafficked
from Eastern Europe and also from Africa and South East Asia.
We do face a significant problem. I think Northern Ireland and
the island of Ireland are targeted collectively by these groups.
We have had success in terms of detecting groups and bringing
them to justice. The latest case was in Wales where a couple who
were running a series of brothels across the whole of Ireland
and into England and laundering the money back into South Africa
were detected and were recently convicted and received substantial
jail sentences for their part.
Q126 Lady Hermon: That is very good.
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
We have had successful prosecutions. We work very closely with
An Garda S-«ochána and also the Serious and Organised
Crime Agency to get that global reach on investigations. The problem
we face is pretty much the same as in the rest of the United Kingdom
in terms of the number of incidents. We can only suspect that
this problem will continue to grow because we are seen as an affluent
part of the world and, therefore, a target for human trafficking
gangs. These brothels have often turned up in areas which have
been purely residential and afterwards people have collectively
thought, "Yes, we saw suspicious behaviour. We saw different
men arriving constantly at different times of the day and night
and we should have reported that to the police". Also, individuals
who have gone along to a brothel have reported their suspicions
around what they have found in those circumstances. It is a new
problem to Northern Ireland, a new problem to Ireland. We are
working in partnership with other law enforcement agencies but
also with those groups who support the individuals that we rescue
from trafficking. We do have a reflection period of some 45 days
and have worked with Woman's Aid and other groups to support the
victims through that period, hopefully towards co-operation with
the police and then on to prosecution. We have been successful
in obtaining the assistance of victims in terms of delivering
prosecutions. A lot of this is driven by fear and by debt bond.
There have been some very awful stories that have come out of
these circumstances. We do not underestimate the problem at all.
It is frustrating for us in that so much of our effort goes into
national security when we still have all this organised crime
and a rising threat from organised crime to deal with. That is
a particular frustration because there is real harm being caused.
We have put a lot of effort into this and have redirected some
of our resources. We have specifically trained officers up in
the skills on this and built up good relationships with the other
agencies involved—UK Borders Agency, SOCA, An Garda S-«ochána
and Europol. It is an area that we have taken very seriously and
it is a completely insidious crime, it is terrible.
Q127 Lady Hermon: Is there a connection
between paramilitaries, whether loyalist or republican, and this
sort of human trafficking? Is there any evidence of that?
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
On one occasion there was evidence of loyalist paramilitaries
being involved in providing the house, in effect, and on one other
occasion dissident republicans also being involved in providing
a house and almost oversight of it, for a fee of course. It is
pretty much internationally focused in terms of organised crime
gangs moving people into these islands in their totality.
Q128 Lady Hermon: Are the organised
crime gangs operating outside the island of Ireland, or not?
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
There is globalisation and a supply route for people to move into
the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland, so people are passed
on. We find that victims have been sold on, in effect, two or
three times and go through a series of movements, usually into
Eastern Europe and are then transited by road across Europe into
these islands, either into the Republic of Ireland or across into
Great Britain and then move across into Northern Ireland after
that.
Q129 Lady Hermon: These very vulnerable
people who are being trafficked, presumably there must be a threat
to their families back home if they run off or put their hands
up and run into the nearest police station? There must be some
sort of deterrent to stop them coming forward to be rescued, if
you like.
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
There can be an element of that and sheer fear of the people who
are holding them and the grip they have on them. It depends on
the strength of the first crime group, the crime group that moved
them on. You hear of Triad gangs, for instance, in South East
Asia being involved in this and they have a very strong grip through
fear in poorer communities. You find that when it is young people
it is the people who have maybe been orphaned or have not got
a lot of family connections. In effect, they go missing and nobody
really misses them. They are carefully selected. It is a level
of evil on all counts. Our fear is that there is not enough public
awareness of it, that people in our society do not really believe
it is happening in Northern Ireland or there is some other reason
for it, they cannot believe what is happening within the island
of Ireland and, therefore, do not have an awareness in terms of
reporting it to the police. We are constantly trying to reinforce
the message that they may be seeing suspicious behaviour which
could be indicative of a brothel and they need to tell the police.
Q130 Stephen Pound: I want to deal
with the GB read-across. You have talked about Eastern Europe.
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
Yes.
Q131 Stephen Pound: In London, and
Mr Baggott will be aware of this, many of the victims were Central
Europeans, ie from Poland, Lithuania, and many of the traffickers
tended to be Romanian or South Balkans, Albanian. Is it that same
sort of pattern?
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
We have only seen one group from Lithuania, a Lithuanian and a
Pole. There has only been one instance and that was a Romanian
crime gang who appeared to be involved in that. Other than that,
movements have been pretty much around South East Asia and South
East Asian individuals facilitating that and controlling brothels
here and the madams, the alpha females who were controlling the
brothels, were South East Asian as well.
Q132 Stephen Pound: I wish that you
had been listening to the tape of this earlier, Chief Constable—in
fact, you may have been for all I know—when we were asking
about the survey that was done last month on police satisfaction,
the PSNI, which on the surface had some worrying things in it:
87% down to 80%. Barry Gilligan said, "Don't worry, Chief
Constable Baggott's gonna sort that out".
Chief Constable Baggott: Thanks,
Barry!
Q133 Stephen Pound: I have to say
all of our witnesses have been extremely complimentary about you,
particularly in the area of personal policing.
Chief Constable Baggott: Thank
you.
Q134 Stephen Pound: I appreciate
that a lot of your answers have been specifically directed at
a restoration of public confidence, but is there anything you
wish to put on record as to how you feel you can turn around those
figures, not just the 87% to 80%, but 56% thought the police were
doing a good job which was down from 64%? Although you have some
good figures, and we can play with the numbers, the trend at the
moment is not in the right direction.
Chief Constable Baggott: Yes,
and there have been three successive falls in confidence and satisfaction.
Part of that is against the backdrop of a worsening security situation
and probably political uncertainty. I do believe that confidence
in policing is very much affected by the overall atmosphere. If
I had been a resident here during the last year and seen a series
of outrages and murders then I think I probably would be starting
to feel pretty uncertain. Inevitably that plays into the figures
irrespective of people's own experiences because the survey is
not just about users but "what do you think" and that
is often based on what you read or what people tell you. The other
thing we need to move in fairly quickly on, which will be in the
review of public administration, is creating even more effective
partnerships which can jointly tackle antisocial behaviour, re-offending
and serious harm in a much more consistent way. At the moment
I think the 29 partnerships are relatively small, so if they had
to deal with the overall impact of re-offending, for example,
people get released from prison and what does the support and
monitoring and supervision look like, and that must involve police,
health, probation, there is a strategic element to that which
is very difficult to do if your partnership is too small. There
are some issues about partnerships. Do I think confidence and
satisfaction will rise? Yes, I do because I think the next phase
of the PSNI's life is moving from policing of the community as
a sort of broad-brush empowerment, problem solving, into some
very clear programme plans around how we are going to hold ourselves
accountable for the quality of every encounter we have with a
member of the public in Northern Ireland. Let me give you a flavour
of that. We are currently working through a process of putting
around 600 police officers back on to the streets who have been
asked to work in administrative roles because of the rigidity
of the way the service has been run. I mean "run" in
the sense of being stuck to rigid establishment numbers and not
having the freedom or carry-forwards that we needed. That will
take place over the next six months to a year. We will get numbers
out in time to match the withdrawal of the full-time reserve that
is taking place at the moment and then that will carry on. It
is important that those numbers are used to deliver a much more
consistent service. The way we are doing that is we are looking
at the whole way in which we manage calls for assistance and in
the next few months we will produce a set of very clear promises
to the public here. We are not going to call it a policing pledge.
We will take some of the best of the policing pledges of the past
and give it a Northern Ireland flavour. We will have neighbourhood
policing in every neighbourhood and how we do it will be dependent
on the security situation but we will have accessible police officers
in the right numbers to make a difference. We are currently mapping
our neighbourhoods and rather than having a variety of interpretations
of that there will be a PSNI standard set out in a series of promises
that if you want to contact your neighbourhood police officer
you can, a neighbourhood police officer will not be abstracted
for other duties. We will set out a very clear standard. I think
that will take the best of what we have got and make it more consistent.
We are defining half a million calls a year, looking to see whether
we can turn those into a much more personal encounter. Rather
than saying, "Sorry, we don't visit because you are a victim
of this crime and you don't fit in with the crimes that we visit",
we will be much more flexible about that. If someone needs a visit
from the police and they want one, we may well schedule the response
and say, "It's not an emergency, when will it be convenient
for you?" providing we can do that within a security framework.
We will use our Blackberries and our mobile data and all that
technology to make our service much more personal. All of that
is what I have been invited to do by my own colleagues as well
as by the public. That is not to say it is not happening, but
we want to make that more consistent. The bit we are going to
do which will take a little more time is in order we can assess
where communities have confidence and where they do not we are
creating a call-back arrangement where we will be calling people
back monthly. We will seek to publish that data openly. If certain
communities are dissatisfied in the service we will ask the question
why: have we given the local commander enough resources; are we
doing the right things. Rather than a yearly survey we are going
to be holding ourselves more accountable. That will come right
down to the individual constable level. If Matt Baggott deals
with a dozen calls in a month, or whatever it might be, and we
ring a dozen people back and say, "How did Matt Baggott do?",
that will feature in Matt Baggott's appraisal. The evidence of
what we are actually doing will shape the way we promote, hold
people accountable and assess their overall performance in the
future. I do not think we need to fear that because we have enough
significant quality and commitment to celebrate what we do, and
hopefully that will help us to celebrate as well as look at where
we are inconsistent. That is the sort of approach we are taking,
much more businesslike.
Q135 Christopher Fraser: Given the
confidence with which you talk about the future and those very
positive moves you are making, would you go as far as to say that
not having devolution has actually hampered policing in Northern
Ireland?
Chief Constable Baggott: I think
devolution should be a confidence-builder. I come back to the
point that it makes people have the conversations about what is
important, and not having that ends up with a series of different
insights and perspectives. I do think overall it will help. I
would not want to put a figure on whether in the next year or
so it will absolutely enhance confidence because there are some
difficult conversations to be had. There are a series of workings
out of who is responsible and accountable.
Q136 Chairman: There are some rather
difficult ones going on at the moment.
Chief Constable Baggott: I think
there are.
Q137 Mr Murphy: Mr Baggott, despite
intensive investigation in both jurisdictions, to date no-one
has been brought to justice for the terrible murder of Paul Quinn.
Are you able to give us any progress on that case today?
Chief Constable Baggott: Perhaps
I will invite Drew to cover the specifics of that.
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
We wrote to the Committee last year in respect of that and, indeed,
there have been no further developments. All significant leads
and, indeed, all leads have been pursued either by ourselves or
our colleagues in An Garda S-«ochána. On their behalf
we carried out a number of arrests and people were interviewed
in the serious crime suite and An Garda S-«ochána
conducted their own arrests as well. It was very much a parallel
investigation and we explored every possible avenue in terms of
significant leads to try and identify the individuals involved
and bring them to justice, but have been thwarted in our efforts.
At present I do not think there are any further leads or significant
lines of inquiry left to pursue so, while the investigation is
not closed, at the moment we are at somewhat of a stalemate.
Q138 Mr Murphy: We have also raised
this with Commissioner Murphy and his team. My first impression
of meeting with Commissioner Murphy, after he crushed my hand,
was if he was the arresting officer I certainly would not resist
arrest. Have you met with Commissioner Murphy?
Chief Constable Baggott: Yes,
I have. We have had some very good meetings. I met with him in
Dublin in my first week here. We had met even before at an organised
crime conference and followed that up with some informal meetings
between the two of us, and I have been down to Dublin again. Before
Christmas he brought his whole command team up and we had half
a day together. We are now taking forward a major piece of work
looking at enhancing our co-operation even further in 15 strategic
areas which a Deputy is leading upon. We are at a point of some
extremely good progress with our colleagues in the Garda. We are
very much of one mind around dealing with the security situation
and serious harm. What we want to look at is making sure that
we do not just keep the status quo on that, we want to push forward
even more. Perhaps Judith will say a few things on that area.
Deputy Chief Constable Gillespie:
Two weeks ago I met with my colleague, Martin Callinan, one of
the Deputy Commissioners for the Garda, to take forward the strategy
for co-operation between PSNI and An Garda S-«ochána.
It has to be said that we have a unique working relationship that
we have built up over many years, a relationship built on mutual
trust and respect, but what we are now moving towards is a written
strategy trying to define the future of where we would like to
go in the next three to five years. We have agreed some broad
areas that we will work together on, some specific goals, and
those areas are operations, investigation, intelligence, legislation,
security, IT and communications, training, human resources, equipment
and emergency planning. Those are very broad areas but the idea
would be that our subject experts on both sides of the border
would work up specific goals and objectives to achieve over the
next three to five years in those areas. Whilst the working relationship
is excellent obviously there is always room for pushing the boundaries
and moving forward and challenging the status quo, in particular
perhaps around some difficult areas on legislation that in the
past we have been unable to push forward on. I am very hopeful
that there will be some tangible progress over the next three
to five years in the lifetime of this strategy.
Q139 Mr Murphy: We were informed
this morning that a senior Garda officer was being seconded here
in Belfast for 12 months. Is that something the PSNI are doing
in reverse? Have you officers seconded to the Garda?
Deputy Chief Constable Gillespie:
We have in the past had officers seconded to An Garda S-«ochána
and this time around we are not seconding a superintendent but
I would be hopeful in the future that we would have future secondments.
The superintendent in question will be coming up within the next
five to six weeks to work in our Community Safety Branch. Approval
in principle has just been given by the Minister in the Department
of Justice and the detail of that has to be worked out over the
next five to six weeks, but he is to start in six weeks' time
with our Community Safety Branch.
Q140 Mr Murphy: We understand that
radio communications are now possible across the border?
Deputy Chief Constable Gillespie:
Yes, that is right. We now have secure radio, which is a significant
step forward. The last time I gave evidence I was talking about
that particular matter and it is now complete, I am pleased to
say.
Chairman: I want to bring in Mr Hepburn
and Mr Fraser and then we will go briefly into private session.
There are some quite dramatic developments taking place outside
this room as well.
Q141 Mr Hepburn: What factors do
you take into consideration when you decide whether to conduct
forensic analysis in-house or actually give it to the forensic
facility over at Carrickfergus?
Chief Constable Baggott: I will
let Drew talk about the specifics but I can let you know where
I come from on this. We have had some of these high level discussions.
I want two things coming out of this. The first is success in
relation to the speed and timeliness of our submissions and making
sure that is very effective. The second is value for money and
there are some challenges that we will be making of ourselves,
for example on the sending off of drugs for testing, and is there
a way we can do that with smaller quantities in-house without
losing the forensic integrity, so are there cheaper ways of conducting
this. These are not judgment calls on my behalf, I do not know
the answer to this, but effectiveness and cost are the two questions
I would be asking about. Drew will have some insight into how
it currently works.
Q142 Chairman: Could I just say before
he does come in that we have visited the Forensic Science Laboratory
and also took formal evidence last week. We were very impressed
by the quality of the work. We know that Deputy Chief Constable
Gillespie has been, but we hope that you will go at an early date
and see for yourself what they are doing because it really is
work of a very high order indeed.
Chief Constable Baggott: Yes,
indeed. Sadly, I had to cancel my visit because of the unfolding
events of the day around Peader Heffron. Unfortunately, I had
to cancel it but that date has been rearranged now. It is only
a question of time, it is not a question of intent.
Q143 Chairman: We understand.
Assistant Chief Constable Harris:
In respect of our relationship with the Forensic Service of Northern
Ireland, we are their principal customer and they are our principal
supplier in terms of forensic science support. We work very closely
with them and I think we have the advantage over some of our counterparts
in the rest of Great Britain in that we have a single relationship
with one supplier for the majority of our forensic science investigation.
Specifically, areas which we still retain would be around fingerprint
examination, footprint examination, but also phone examination
and e-crime, which is the examination of computer hard drives
in particular. There is a lot of investigative work which now
flows into particularly phone examination and e-crime examination.
We have built up our own expertise in respect of that and as this
has developed our expertise has developed incrementally. From
an early stage occasionally you would come across computers and
phones but they are now present in all major crime investigations
and give us very significant leads in terms of evidential work
that we can do and consequently we have resourced this part of
our major crime investigation. The great majority of this we would
take on ourselves. It is only the most complicated investigations
which we would forward on to the Forensic Science Laboratory.
Very often you come across a phone, which is a pretty simple device,
and, therefore, well within our capabilities. Depending on the
type of phone and how often we come across it, if it was beyond
our capabilities we would use the Forensic Science Laboratory.
There are so many of these that to put them all to the Forensic
Science Laboratory without a significant uplift in their resources
would completely flood their workplace and also the same would
be true of e-crime in terms of researching hard drives. We are
in negotiation constantly with the prosecuting authorities as
to how much examination is required of hard drives to actually
prove the requisite offences. One of the examinations of hard
drives is obviously around indecent images of children. How many
images actually constitute the charge? Some of these computers
have hundreds of thousands of images on them and instead of exploring
all of that we want to get to a place where we can take a sample
of probably many thousands of images, upwards of 20,000 images.
We are constantly looking at the amount of work we need to do
to prove the charge, but we are at a criminal standard of proof
so there is an obligation on us to apply the very highest standards
and to be exacting as to any material that we recover.
Q144 Chairman: There is another point
I would make without asking you to comment at the moment because
the Chief Constable has yet to visit. This is not casting any
aspersions on what you do in-house at all, but we were greatly
impressed by the independence and integrity of their work, by
the high quality and calibre of their young scientists and the
training they had received. At the end of the day there is no
substitute for utterly impartial objective scientific evidence.
We just ask you to reflect on that when you go and see them.
Chief Constable Baggott: I certainly
will. I would not disagree with that at all. The ambition I would
have is to use that independence and excellence in relation to
the serious and complicated to try and speed up some of the justice
processes at the moment. If we can take out the non-contentious
and deal with that in a quicker and speedier way, whether that
is through spectrometry of drugs or in-house, that is the trick
in terms of value for money. Certainly I know enough of it by
reputation to endorse what you said, Chairman.
Q145 Mr Hepburn: Just to move on
to the issue of budgets, has the increase in the dissident threat
had any effect on your thinking in forming the next financial
year's budget?
Chief Constable Baggott: Yes,
it has in the sense that part of the package for devolution has
had to be the assurance that we are capable of meeting quickly
an increased risk and threat and sustaining that into the longer
term. Clearly what we have built is a greater infrastructure,
be that forensic, technical, sheer numbers, and I have increased
slightly in the last week or so Drew's capabilities to deal with
that emerging threat. We need to sustain that. If there is a way
of dealing with it in a quicker and more effective way I do not
want to have to create a business plan that will take a year or
two years, I need that resource now. Access to the Security Fund
is critical. The second issue is I need to be able to negotiate,
whether through the NIO or devolved structure, a sustained street
presence. It would be very easy to drop the budget and suddenly
lose 400 or 500 police officers, but I need a public order capability
and I need to deliver personal policing, which is the backdrop
of confidence building, and I need to sustain that into the future.
In terms of budget, I am anxious that we do not get drawn into
an expectation that we will deliver an over-ambitious set of efficiency
savings and I think we need to be made an exception. I am not
saying that we do not need to become more efficient and do not
need to work within a budget, but developing a policing service
over the next two or three years needs sustained effort and sustained
resourcing, particularly in a security situation. We have been
doing some quite hard and focused talking about the level of efficiencies
that I shall be expected to make next year and the year after,
and I think we need to stick to that.
Q146 Christopher Fraser: You talked
earlier about the withdrawal of the full-time reserve. What conclusions
have you reached on that phasing out or retention of full-time
reserves given that the Police Federation have expressed strong
public opposition to phasing out and there is talk of an enlarged
part-time reserve?
Chief Constable Baggott: Thank
you very much. A very difficult decision because speaking out
publicly might inadvertently give the impression that I do not
respect entirely and very fully the commitment and service given
by full-time reserve colleagues. You can easily slip into talking
about enhancing the business of policing but I am very mindful
of the fact that there are individual colleagues here, some of
whom have served for a long time. I need to say that. Nothing
I say here should be interpreted as disrespectful of their value
or worth over many years. I arrived in the middle of a judicial
review, so to some degree I had to pick up the pass, and rightly
so. I implemented a security review, which is very thorough, to
look at where we are in terms of technology, training and need.
I looked at that alongside the strategic review which was the
piece of work conducted in the summer which identified many hundreds
of police officers working behind desks. The decision that we
came to at the end of that was we would be better investing the
money that we currently spend on the full-time reserve, bearing
in mind that they have a variety of different roles, in releasing
fully trained, fully paid, operational police officers from behind
desks under a very speedy process. That would give more street
presence and more capability than spending the money on retaining
the full-time reserves. It was a purely objective decision, again
on which all the Chief Officers were absolutely unanimous that
it was the right thing to do. That is the first issue. The second
issue is we also need to reconfigure where we have our people,
using assistant investigators and releasing police skills. If
I had retained the full-time reserve, which is an historical way
of dealing with security, we would not have been able to reconfigure
the way in which the PSNI actually operates and does its business.
The third issue is I cannot go to the Treasury and ask for more
money when a strategic review has shown there are hundreds of
police officers being paid to do administrative tasks which should
be done by police staff, or they are servicing ineffective processes.
I have worked with the Treasury long enough to know the questions
they would ask. To ask for more money to retain a full-time reserve
when you are sitting with twice as many people behind desks is
not a compelling argument. There is a real world about that which
I need to be cognisant of as a Chief. The other issue is in reality
the severance agreement reached under Patten is only available
now. There are no signs that I can ring-fence, it is not in my
gift. The messages are very clear that severance will come to
an end in April 2011, retraining will start in June 2010 and now
we are in the middle of a recession I cannot see that severance
being ring-fenced into the future as a matter of personal choice.
Some of the confusion around this has been, "If the Chief
were to choose to ring-fence severance into the future, would
you like to stay?" but this is not in my gift. These are
decisions that have been made. We looked at all of this in the
round and I am firmly convinced that the decision to release operational
police officers, and to allow people to leave with a relatively
generous severance package, albeit some do not receive a huge
amount of money, we should be very cognisant of that, is the right
decision to make. I do not know whether you want to say anything,
Judith?
Deputy Chief Constable Gillespie:
Many full-time reserve colleagues have joined the regular PSNI.
Almost every squad of student officers passing out, or graduating
as we now say, includes a number of full-time reserves. Secondly,
we have recently advertised for 60 civilian detention officer
posts, again to release regular police officers back out into
visible policing roles. Many of those posts have been applied
for by full-time reserve colleagues and also assistant investigators,
which Crime Ops are now employing, and across our Professional
Standards Department some of those posts have been taken up by
full-time reserves. It is important that we do not lose the experience
of working in the Northern Ireland environment that many of those
officers have. I should stress that they have applied for and
gained those posts through a merit selection process. There is
no question of full-time reserves going out one door and coming
in wearing a different uniform the next day, they have come through
a merit selection process and gained those posts on their own
merit.
Q147 Christopher Fraser: You mentioned
earlier that the intake is higher in age in terms of the people
coming into the force. Is that because they cannot find employment
elsewhere and this is an easy option because you are recruiting
or do you have any data that proves this is a first career option
for people, which goes back to your reserve point about people
coming into the main force?
Deputy Chief Constable Gillespie:
Obviously any employment pool is a factor of the economic context
in which we all work, but many people are coming into this organisation
as graduates on masters degrees, indeed a small number with doctorates.
It is not like they have tried lots of other employment opportunities
and the PSNI is the avenue of last resort. In most cases we are
the avenue of first resort, an employer of choice. Some people
will go through the recruitment process not once, not twice, but
three or more times to get through the process to get into the
organisation.
Chairman: We will have to move on to
the private session now. Thank you very much for the public evidence
session.
|
