London VAWG Board meeting minutes - 6 December 2021

Present         

Diana Luchford - Chair – MOPAC

Aisha Graham-Sharif - MOPAC

Alice Bird - MOPAC

Jain Lemom – MOPAC

Lizzie Peters – MOPAC

Michael Taylor – MOPAC

Paul Rowan – MOPAC

Rebecca Potton – MOPAC

Robin Merrett – MOPAC

Susan Price - MOPAC

Tina Price - MOPAC

Andrea Simon – EVAW

Chloe Collins – NHS

Chris Thorne - HMCTS

Denise Yard - MPS

Jane Connors - MPS

Katie Nash – HMPPS

Lisa Ramsarran – CPS

Nour Gazarin – WRC

Rachel Buttrick – London Councils

Rachel Nicholas – Victim Support

Sarbjit Ganger -AWRC

Viv Hayes - WRC

Apologies

Clive Grimshaw - London Councils

Diane Egan - London Heads of Community Safety

Fenella Beckman – Housing Directors Network

Melanie Dales - MPS

The Board was welcomed to the meeting. 

VAWG remains a priority for MOPAC and the Mayor and VAWG Board will play a key role in overseeing the next VAWG Strategy and monitoring emerging VAWG trends. 

MOPAC has recently undertaken a review of all its partnership boards, including the VAWG Board. 

Following this review, the structure of all these boards will be changed in order to ensure the effective oversight of the London Police and Crime Plan. 

The minutes of the last meeting were agreed; all actions are completed or are being covered in this meeting. 

The MPS is aware that the murder of Sarah Everard has had a detrimental impact on public confidence in the MPS. The Board received an overview of the draft MPS VAWG Action Plan; the final version will be published in March 2022, following further consultation, and will continue to undergo review after this time. 

The MPS is trialling Project Vigilant, which focuses on tackling perpetrators, in Lambeth and Southwark; following an evaluation, it is expected to be expanded across BCUs. Domestic Abuse Matters training has been delivered to 6500 front line MPS officers. 

MPS staff are also receiving digital media training about supporting victims whose phones are needed for evidence and how to investigate perpetrators phones. 

A Walk and Talk initiative has female officers engaging with members of the public about their feelings of safety in their local areas. 

Innovation Hubs also enable local communities to suggest ideas to MPS on safety issues. 

Public Protection Improvement Plan is working on how protection plans can be used to tackle perpetrators, and the Predatory Offender Units have over 2000 arrests. 

To improve the MPS culture, the Corruption Board is reviewing historic misconduct cases, and supporting colleagues throughout the MPS who wish to raise any concerns. 

Town Centre teams were launched on 06 December 2021 to engage with local communities.

The public can use Street Safe, an online reporting tool, to identify where they feel unsafe, so that the BCUs can identify hotspots and run targeted patrols via Operation Verona. 

Police and Crime Plan (PCP)

The Board received an overview of the development of the PCP, which will have a small number of focused priorities with set objectives.  The consultation launched on 16 November 2021 and ran until 21 January 2022; the feedback will then inform the final version of the PCP, which will be published by the end of March 2022. 

The top priorities are that: victims are better supported, violence is prevented and reduced, and trust and confidence increases. MOPAC held multiple engagement events to receive feedback from partners and the public. 

VAWG Strategy

Numerous workshops are being held with partners to receive feedback on specific themes within the Strategy, which is being developed in parallel to the PCP.  MOPAC will then assess any potential knowledge gaps and conduct further engagement as necessary. 

Key themes within the Strategy are: prevention, tackling perpetrators and supporting victims and survivors. Perceptions of public safety and trust and confidence will also be cross-cutting themes.  

The Strategy will be developed through a public health and potentially a human rights approach.

The Board received an overview of Soteria, detailing how the London Rape Review identified the challenges of supporting victims within the criminal justice system, which led to work to increase the number of RASSO convictions. 

A Soteria pilot was subsequently established in Avon and Summerset and is expanding to conduct 5 Deep Dives within difference police services, which will include full engagement with police officers and victims. 

The pillars of Bluestone are: a suspect-focused investigation; disruption of and challenging repeat offenders; embedding of systematic procedural justice in victim engagement during the investigative process; officer learning, development, and wellbeing joined up seamlessly with the challenges of RASSO complaints in force as well as academic evidence drawn from a variety of disciplines;  data-led, performance-savvy monitoring and evaluation of new investigative strategies and justice outcomes, to improve understanding of RASSO reporting and outcomes.

Further funding now enables a deep dive research into the MPS, which has conducted initial research and will be reporting results shortly.  In early 2022, further research will be conducted across the five police services, which will feedback into the development of a Framework. 

A National Learning Network has been established to share learning from the research as they arrive and learning for police officers has been developed. 

The MOPAC VAWG Team circulated a report providing an update on MOPAC programmes.

MOPAC is developing a VAWG Campaign, which is expected to be launched in March 2022. This will initially focus on perpetrators of VAWG and will later cover other topics throughout the campaign.