Forensic Science Service

Written evidence submitted by Abigail Snasdell (FSS 64)

1. Introduction: I am writing to you to express my concern and horror at the proposed closure of the FSS. I wrote to the Committee at the beginning of January to highlight this issue and I am delighted that you have announced an inquiry.

2. Declaration of interest: I am employed by the FSS at their London laboratory as a Senior Forensic Scientist. I specialise in the examination of firearms, ammunition and related items and in the interpretation of firearms related damage and gunshot wounds. I have specialised continuously and exclusively in this field since November 2001, having joined the FSS in September 2000 in their Evidence Recovery Unit. I am also a guest lecturer for the ‘Fibres, Firearms and Fire’ module of the BSc degree course in Forensic Science at Kingston University and for the ‘Criminalistics’ module of the BSc degree course in Forensic Science at the London Metropolitan University. I am a published author in my field and I am a member of the Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners, the Forensic Science Society and the British Academy of Forensic Sciences. However, it should be noted that the thoughts and opinions expressed in this submission are my own and I do not speak on behalf of the FSS. I work under my maiden name Abigail Hannam.

3. Background: I feel it should be said from the beginning that I believe the FSS needs to change as it has been run inefficiently for several years. Its current structure has become exceedingly top heavy with ridiculous layers of unnecessary senior management. As such the FSS was going through a thorough, planned and Home Office agreed transformation process when the closure announcement was made. This has led to the stream lining of the company resulting in the closure of four sites. This was agreed with the previous Government, who also gave the FSS grants to achieve the transformation. Indeed, I understand that ministers of the coalition Government visited the laboratory recently and commended the senior management team on the transformation process and how well they have done and that they were impressed that the FSS was actually ahead of the planned timescales for the project. Why has the FSS not been given the opportunity to show this has worked? Surely it would have been beneficial for the UKCJS to allow this transformation to be completed? It is frustrating and disappointing that this transformation process has not been able to prove itself before the Government made this unilateral and unconsulted decision. In addition to the structure of the company, there are several other important reasons why the FSS is not making any profit: a) it has been left with the cost heavy, time consuming forensic disciplines since competitors have lured away the more lucrative work, b) it invests heavily in research and development and is a world leader in forensic technology, c) it has had the financial burden of extensively training staff. Becoming a qualified forensic scientist, especially one who can attend and report scenes, can often take up to 8 years, sometimes longer. Competitors who deliberately poach FSS staff have not had to invest in this training. If none of the above is now going to be carried out by the FSS, who will do it?

4. The forensic marketplace in England and Wales and its effect on the UKCJS: My greatest concern is who will carry out the forensic science provision in the absence of the FSS? Surely the 120,000 cases a year we deal with must be carried out by someone else in the future? The alternative that it just falls by the wayside is simply too horrendous to contemplate. The Government has said that it would like this work to be done by private companies. However, it appears that the current private companies do not have the money to take us on – LGC Ltd (the largest private company) was recently made to transfer staff from the London FSS Drugs department under the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations as they won the Metropolitan Police drugs contract. They could not afford to keep them and so made them redundant on their first day of work at LGC. Incredibly this redundancy bill was paid by the Met itself! If companies like LGC do not have the resources to employ the staff from the FSS to do the work that we currently do, who is going to be able to? The profitable work has already been taken by competitors, what has been left behind are the unprofitable, time heavy disciplines such as firearms, fire investigation, document examination, fibre analysis, blood pattern analysis etc. These disciplines are often at the core of high profile, violent crime investigations and must be maintained. Which private company is going to offer to do them on the scale that the FSS does? The fact that the FSS has failed to become a profitable company has proved that 'forensics for profit' does not work. Why then is the Government pushing forensic science even further down the road of privatization? Forensic science is fundamental to the provision of justice. It is a necessary service not a luxury.  Some things should not be seen as a commodity, sold to the highest bidder. This slapdash, let’s make as much money as possible, approach will only lead to the fragmentation of forensic provision in England and Wales. This in turn will have disastrous effects on the UKCJS. The reason why no other country in the world has gone down this road is because it simply does not work. It should be stopped immediately.  

5. ‘In-house’ Police forensic departments: If the Government does not want to have any role in the provision of forensic science why then is it allowing the proliferation of Police 'in-house' forensic departments such as the Metropolitan Police Service Forensic Firearms Unit (MPSFFU)? The Government is very much paying for these via the Police budgets. These 'in-house' departments only serve the Police Forces that they sit in. Surely closing these departments rather than the FSS would free up significant amounts of money which could be diverted to the FSS, a company which does not discriminate against any Police Force or any organisation and which covers the whole of England and Wales. With the current model of forensic provision, if the various non-financially attractive disciplines described previously are not bought by the private companies the Government refers to, then the work will have to be done by these 'in-house' Police forensic departments. This will ultimately lead to a postcode lottery of forensic provision as the smaller forces will not be able to afford to set these up. The criminals will fast catch onto this and will know where they are less likely to get caught. Closing these 'in-house' departments will also tackle the problem of the perceived lack of partiality of police employees carrying out the forensic work of police-led investigations. The FSS was originally set up to not only create a forensic marketplace, but to also be an independent provider to the UKCJS, to introduce distance between forensic scientists and the police investigators. Impartiality is at the very core of any forensic investigation. Why are we risking going backwards to the days of miscarriages of justice? Only a few weeks ago a story broke about the suppression of police evidence involving under-cover police officers. Can the Government be 100% sure that forensic evidence provided by an ‘in-house’ department will not be suppressed if it does not suit the Police investigation?

6. Fragmentation of forensic science: Customers come to the FSS knowing that every single aspect of their case can be investigated, whatever the discipline(s) required. There is no need to go to other providers as the FSS is the only company that can carry out ALL aspects of forensic investigation. This will now be fragmented, with different providers doing different parts of the case. Where will the quality assurance be? Where will the consistency be? Will the other providers, including the ‘in-house’ Police departments, be UKAS accredited to ISO17025? What standard operating procedures will be followed? What competency testing will be carried out? Will blind quality trials be carried out? Will they be regulated like the FSS has been? Who really will be experts and who will be merely imitations? What level of security clearance will scientists at these commercial providers have? Currently all members of the FSS firearms department are cleared through the Home Office Departmental Security Unit to SC level. This allows us access up to SECRET and supervised access to TOP SECRET assets and therefore allows us to work on the most sensitive of cases.

7. Maximising evidential value from exhibits: The FSS routinely do many joint examinations on items involving scientists from different disciplines examining the same item at the same time, eg firearms, biology, gunshot residues, fingerprints, toolmark examiners, fibres etc. Following the inevitable fragmentation of forensic science how will these essential joint examinations now take place between different providers? These examinations need to continue to occur so that different evidence types are not lost during examinations and the evidential value of each exhibit is maximised.

8. Anti-Terrorist and complex casework: What will happen in the event of another serious terrorist attack in the UK? The recent London bombings were dealt with by the FSS. Biologists put their lives on hold, camped up in the hotel next to the lab and worked round the clock to enable the work to get done in a speedy fashion. This, along with work in other departments, allowed the supply of fast, accurate and impartial intelligence to the police so that they could prioritise their investigations and focus on bringing the perpetrators to justice. One has to ask oneself if a private company that is only interested in base-line profits would do the same? I strongly suspect not. This sort of work should transcend money and profitable margins. We are told on a daily basis that we are at an ever-increasing threat from terrorism. How ironic, and incredible, that at the time the national security level has been raised to 'severe' the most important provider of forensic terrorist investigation is to close. What provision has been put in place for the forensic investigation of terrorist activity? SO15 and SOCA do not use the ‘in-house’ Met forensic department, they use the FSS. Who will they use now? How could a new company or an existing company that is new to forensic terrorist investigation be the best placed to carry out this work? Surely what the country needs at times of such devastation are a safe pair of experienced cohesive forensic hands, a company that employs the most eminent and senior forensic scientists in all disciplines within the UK, not companies that employ the least experienced because they are cheaper. 

9. Firearm related terrorist incidents and police fatal shootings: What if the next terrorist attack is in the style of the recent Mumbai-shooting rampage? The MPSFFU can not offer scene or post mortem coverage as they do not have the relevant competencies to do this work. The firearms examiners at the FSS can, and do, offer a 24/7, 365 day scene/post mortem call out rota. The FSS is currently the first, and I suspect only, point of call for all terrorist forensic investigation, especially firearms related incidents. Whenever a policeman or woman fires a shot, whether fatal or otherwise, the IPCC will at some point be involved in the investigation. This is becoming an ever-increasing occurrence.  For reasons of perceived impartiality, the MPSFFU are currently not allowed to be involved in any Police case where the IPCC are involved. This is currently done by the FSS. Who will do this work now? These cases are usually very high profile (in recent years the cases of Mark Saunders and Raoul Moat immediately spring to mind) and again surely their investigation warrants the attention of experienced and knowledgeable firearms examiners, not newcomers to the field.  

10. Position of the FSS in Europe and the rest of the world: The FSS is ingrained into the European forensic community. Indeed the current ENFSI (European Network of Forensic Science Institutes) Expert Working Group - Firearms/Gunshot Residues chairman is Mark Mastaglio, the Firearms Principal Scientist of the FSS. We have contributed significantly to the introduction and development of forensic practice throughout Europe. Who is going to continue to represent the United Kingdom within Europe once the FSS is gone? There is a free flow of intelligence, research and development, advice and knowledge across the continent. This would and could not happen with a purely private, commercially driven, company.  The UK will simply be left out of the loop. What a travesty for a country that was a world pioneer. Indeed, it is not just within Europe that the FSS is interwoven into the fabric of forensic provision; it has contributed greatly to the training of forensic scientists around the globe and in setting up forensic institutions. I personally have been involved in the training of scientists from Abu Dhabi in the field of firearms. Other colleagues have been seconded to Trinidad and Tobago to help clear backlogs of firearms cases and set up a more streamlined firearms department. These are just two of many examples. DNA products and software that have been pioneered and developed by the FSS are in use worldwide. Who is going to continue with this important work once we are gone? Within the firearms section FSS scientists have been integral to many complex international investigations such as those in Afghanistan, Jamaica, Kosovo, Somaliland, Kenya, Brunei, British Virgin Islands, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Iraq. Who will do this once the FSS has gone? It is highly likely that foreign Governments and international organizations like the UN will be reluctant to solicit the help and advice of purely private, profit driven, companies.

11. Cold case reviews: What will happen with cold case reviews? Currently the FSS is heavily involved in this process in both an investigative capacity but also in developing new forensic tools at considerable time and expense to advance the field and therefore allow the re-examination of exhibits from the original submissions. Who is going to be able to do this once the FSS is gone?

12. Practicalities: Has any consideration been given to the practical ramifications of this decision? Where are the millions of FSS casefiles going to be housed? Where are the millions of retained FSS items going to be housed? How are expert witnesses going to be contacted in the future when they are needed at Court? How will the experts get their files? Where will the cases that have been completed on our newly introduced electronic casefile system (eCase) be stored? How will we access eCase in the future when the files needed to be printed for Court? Is the current eCase technology future-proof so that there will still be ways of accessing this electronic data in decades to come if there has been no IT development of the system?

13. Personal: I entered into this career as a vocation and I thoroughly enjoy what I do. It has never been about money, and it is extremely disheartening to see that the work that myself and my hard working colleagues do has been reduced to merely to pounds and pence. I worked hard to join the FSS having spent a total of 5 years at University gaining a BSc (Hons) degree in Experimental Pathology and an MSc degree in Forensic Science. To think that in a maximum of 13 months I could be made redundant fills me with great sadness. The FSS was once a great service to work for with an international reputation for excellence, however it feels that the ethics of this service have been eroded away and the emphasis is now on targets, profits and chargeable hours. It is my opinion that ‘forensic science for profit’ does not work and that the FSS worked best when it was an Executive Agency of the Home Office. We were close enough to the Home Office to be strictly regulated, but we were independent of the police so that we were rightly perceived by the UKCJS as being impartial. I implore you to research the option of returning the FSS to an Executive Agency.

14. Petition: May I also take this opportunity to bring your attention to a petition that has been set up to help save the FSS - http://www.petitionbuzz.com/petitions/savethefss. At the time of writing this submission there were 24,590 signatures. This demonstrates the level of feeling there is against the closure of the Forensic Science Service and should not be overlooked.

15. Summary: The expertise that the FSS holds within its staff is world class. The training and experience that it provides its staff are second to none. The research and development it has carried out, and which it continues to do, has greatly added to the tools available to those investigating serious crime. It is a national asset that is fundamental to the proper investigation and prosecution of crime in this country. If the FSS were to be abolished then that experience, that expertise, and that ability to train and to perpetuate and to improve upon that expertise, would be spread to the winds. One accepts that some of the experts will be employed by different companies, or soldier on in private practice, but the strength of the organisation would be lost. Once such an institution is gone it is nigh on impossible to rebuild it in the future as the skills are lost. The result is that the state is deprived of the capacity to properly investigate and to prosecute crime. I hope the Committee agrees and finds in favour of keeping this fine bastion of forensic science.

Abigail Snasdell

9 February 2011