Building a Safer London

This Plan sets out a series of outcomes for each of the themes referenced above. MOPAC will use a mixture of quantitative and qualitative measures to present a picture of crime, safety and confidence in policing in London and to monitor delivery. We have avoided numerical targets and any measures liable to change in the way they are recordedReference:1 or which may create perverse incentivesReference:2. These London measures also align with the Home Office’s National Policing Measures. In line with the Mayor’s commitment to identifying and addressing disproportionality, we will look at performance through the lens of people’s protected characteristics.

Beneath the framework presented in this plan will sit a further suite of measures providing supporting detail. These will be published on the MOPAC website.

Protecting people from exploitation and harm includes child criminal exploitation, child sexual exploitation, child sexual abuse, radicalisation, missing persons, modern slavery, mental health and a wide range of other issues. The breadth and complexity of safeguarding work means it is difficult to reflect performance with statistics alone – for this reason we will also make use of qualitative information as well – such as Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) inspection reports and academic studies – to help us to understand performance and identify issues that need to be addressed.

To help us understand how safe Londoners are, how safe you feel, and how effectively we are tackling the issues that matter to you, we will expand the MOPAC Public Attitude Survey (PAS) of Londoners. The PAS aims to gauge what Londoners think about policing and crime in the capital, and to understand the issues that matter to you. The survey measures Londoners’ perceptions of the MPS, identifies local policing priorities and captures views and experiences across a range of crime and safety issues. The survey has taken place since 1983 and is widely recognised as setting a gold standard for understanding citizens’ views of policing. The PAS already reaches a significant and representative sample of Londoners – 12,800 per year. During this Plan period, we will increase the sample size for the PAS – increasing the number of people surveyed each year to 19,000 - and include additional questions on Londoners’ experiences of crime in their local area. This will provide richer information, over and above police recorded crime, with which we can steer and assess our activities. We will work with the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to make this as robust as possible and will publish the findings for Londoners to access.

The chapters below describe the priorities, how MOPAC and the VRU, the MPS and our partners will work to achieve the outcomes set out, and how we will measure progress.

The COVID-19 pandemic is the biggest crisis to affect our city in living memory. London has suffered the premature deaths of thousands of citizens and incurred severe damage to its economy and wider society. The pandemic has also further exposed long-standing inequalities in our society; with the virus and its economic and social harms disproportionally affecting Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic communities, people with disabilities and women.

The Mayor is determined that, as we look to rebuild and recover from the pandemic, we seize the moment to not only address the immediate impacts, but to make our city a better, fairer, safer place for all. He has established the London Recovery Board, including representatives from a variety of agencies and organisations including the Greater London Authority (GLA), the MPS and local authorities, together with business and community representatives, to help steer the work ahead.

The London Recovery Board is working on nine ‘missions’, all of which contribute to the Mayor’s vision for a more confident, healthier, prosperous and fairer London.

These missions are:

• A Green New Deal
• A Robust Safety Net
• High Streets for All
• A New Deal for Young People
• Good Work for All
• Mental Health & Wellbeing
• Digital Access for All
• Healthy Food, Healthy Weight
• Building Strong Communities

The MPS has played a leading role on the London Recovery Board in the creation of London’s first-ever city-wide Anchor Institutions’ Charter. Through the Charter some of the city’s biggest organisations – including the GLA, the MPS and TfL - have committed to working together by using their procurement and recruitment power to maximise employment opportunities and help young people to flourish. The MPS has pledged to spend £84m of its total goods and services purchased on London-based micro, small, diverse and Voluntary Community and Social Enterprise businesses in 2022, scaling up to an estimated £294m by 2025. The MPS is also one of the first public sector bodies to sign up to Minority Supplier Development UK (MSDUK) to verify diversity of business ownership.

In March 2022 the London Recovery Board agreed to boost work to tackle the structural inequalities driving the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 through collective work on 14 actions spanning themes of labour market, financial hardship, equity in public services and civil society strength. The actions are ones that London Recovery Board members such as the MPS can take as employers, service providers and as influencers, in order to make targeted progress on entrenched inequalities affecting Londoners. Many of the actions, such as involving communities in the design and delivery of services and prioritising work to address structural racism, align with wider work by the MPS and provide scope to take this further alongside other London Recovery Board members.

Safety is a critical foundation for London’s recovery and the Police and Crime Plan aligns with and complements the work of the London Recovery Board.

At the heart of the Mayor’s approach to reducing violence is prevention. The Mayor was clear he wanted to do something different, focusing determined efforts on tackling the causes of violence alongside enforcement.

He was also clear that London should adopt a “public health” approach towards violence, meaning that we: base our decisions on data and evidence; prioritise early intervention and prevention; place communities and young people at the heart of change; develop immediate and long-term solutions with partners; and evaluate our work to understand what works. This is the golden thread uniting all our work on violence. Exemplifying this approach, in 2019 he set up England’s first Violence Reduction Unit (VRU) within MOPAC to tackle the underlying causes of violence.

Working together in partnership is essential - to genuinely change behaviour we must examine the influences and contexts that impact upon individuals at significant points in their life – issues outside the remit of policing alone. For example, their school experience, their family life, their peer groups and their influences and opportunities growing up can all influence susceptibility to victimisation or offending. This Plan sets out how we will work with a range of public and private sector bodies and communities across London to develop better policy, ensure consistency, share good practice and invest in the most impactful programmes.

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Mayor’s relentless focus on reducing violence affecting young people during his first term in office was beginning to have an impact. During the pandemic we saw further, steep reductions in violence. Between May 2016 and January 2022, knife crime with injury fell by 14%, knife crime with injury affecting under 25s fell by 24%; and gun crime fell by 27%, according to police data.

However, violence remains too high, taking an appalling toll on our city – particularly on teenagers and young people. Throughout this term, the Mayor will maintain a relentless focus on reducing violence affecting young peopleReference:3. He is determined that no stone be left unturned in further driving down violence affecting young people, working with partner agencies on a public health approach to tackling the underlying causes of violence, alongside tough police enforcement against the most dangerous and violent individuals.

• The MPS will continue to disrupt criminal gangs and bring to prosecution the most dangerous violent offenders. It will prioritise resources to places where the risk of violence is highest and implement a new Problem Oriented Policing (POP)Reference:4 approach. The Mayor will continue to support these efforts with funding, which has already resulted in the creation of a dedicated Violent Crime Task Force.
• MPS Specialist Crime and Operation Viper teams will continue determined efforts to pursue dangerous firearms offenders and to remove guns from London’s streets.
• The MPS will continue to work to improve sanction detection rates for violent offences, and to use judicial restrictions to target and restrict the offending of dangerous individuals and groups.
• Since its creation the VRU has received £35.4 million of Mayoral funding, and additional annual allocations from the Home Office. In 2021, the VRU funded 266 programmes and projects which supported more than 70,000 young Londoners. The VRU will continue to deliver against its current strategy which prioritises supporting young people, with a range of programmes aimed at reducing risks faced by young Londoners; supporting them in staying safe and putting in place long-term arrangements to provide positive opportunities for young people to fulfil their potential. During this Plan period, the VRU will develop a refreshed strategy.
• Through the Mayor’s New Deal for Young People, the GLA, the VRU, London Borough councils, community groups and others across the city will work in partnership to provide access to a dedicated mentor to young Londoners who are most in need of support and who face the biggest challenges to reaching their potential. This includes children who have been excluded from school or college, those who are impacted by exploitation, young Londoners who are impacted by domestic abuse or living in poverty, and those involved in the care system.
• TfL, the MPS and British Transport Police (BTP)Reference:5 will focus on high-harm offences on London’s public transport and road networks. This includes activity to keep knives off the network.
• MOPAC and the VRU will continue to invest in the provision of support for young people impacted by violence - including those seen to be offenders but have also often experienced victimisation - to reduce the risk of violence to both themselves and others. This includes specialist support to young victims of violence requiring hospital treatment; young victims of crime linked to gangs; and protecting young people from exploitation by gangs. Improving the gender responsive approach to address the often less-visible needs of young women and girls will be a key component of this work, ensuring that women and girls impacted by violence and gang association are better identified and supported.
• Whilst the understanding of the complex causes of violence has improved in line with a public health focused approach, MOPAC has commissioned a new problem profile into youth and group violence to ensure that the current partnership response evolves to meet the needs of young people. The profile, alongside significant evaluations including London Gang Exit (LGE) and County Lines Rescue and Response will be published in 2022, informing and driving our future investment and commissioning of interventions and activity to tackle exploitation and violence during this Plan period.
• The MPS will offer targeted support where identified within secondary schools, including Pupil Referral Units (PRUs), to deliver a child-centred approach to policing, ensure any young victims are best supported and the most vulnerable are safeguarded. This will be achieved through Safer Schools Partnerships to tackle high-risk, high-harm criminality that affects young people. Further investment will be made for Safer Schools Officers to deliver preventative education focused on contextual safeguarding to best protect, support and inform primary-aged school children.
• MPS Youth Engagement and Diversion Officers will be deployed in every London Borough to support local youth provision organisations and agencies by forging stronger positive relations with young people - built on trust and confidence - whilst providing opportunities for intervention and diversion to help young people on the cusp of criminality through the use of a youth referral systems and outreach work with the most vulnerable young people.
• The MPS will continue to deliver Volunteer Police Cadets as its flagship youth diversion programme, the largest police cadet scheme in the UK. This is available to all young Londoners aged 10-18 years old, supporting vulnerable young people and celebrating all diverse backgrounds in London. The programme offers young Londoners exciting opportunities to learn new life skills and build confidence in a policing family environment, along with supporting vulnerable young people to help them reach their potential now and into the future.
• Alongside its work to build long-term partnerships, the Mayor recognises the immediate imperative to ensure that all partners are collectively doing everything they can to prevent and respond to violent crime. That is why MOPAC has been convening regular Tackling Violence Partnership meetings, involving not only the MPS but many other partners. MOPAC will continue to do so, further strengthening that work in the future.
• MOPAC, through work led by the VRU, will continue to support local Community Safety Partnerships to deliver local violence and vulnerability plans.
• We know that there is often a link between violent offending on London’s streets and disputes, harassment and threats taking place online. MOPAC will work with the MPS and London Probation to explore how to strengthen the management of violent individuals’ online behaviour, as well as their behaviour in communities.
• There is an ongoing debate around images of knives and dangerous weapons seized by the police being published online – with concerns that this could contribute to a sense of fear in communities, particularly amongst young people. The Young People’s Action Group (YPAG) - a group of young people working with the VRU - has commissioned research led by University College London to investigate the effect that images of knives have on young people’s perceptions of safety in London, the level of knife carrying as well as the fears and attitudes of seeing images of knives posted online. This research will be published in 2022.
• There is little evidence on the situational drivers of violence. Homicide causes severe harm and is societally expensive, with the estimated cost in 2018/19 being £420million, but we know little about how to prevent it. The VRU would like to understand the motives behind violent incidents and the events that precede them, in order to inform interventions. The VRU have therefore commissioned the Behavioural Insights Team, with support from the MPS, to gain a better insight into the situation and context leading up to violent incidents that result in homicide. This Research will be published in 2022.
• Previous research commissioned by the VRU highlighted that neighbourhoods characterised by high rates of violence tend to be more deprived in multiple ways. It has also brought together findings that many neighbourhoods in London that have high levels of deprivation have experienced this for decades. However, it is not clear what explains this persistence of area-level deprivation and the often-associated violence. In addition, the relationship between neighbourhood poverty and violence is also not consistent and not all deprived neighbourhoods experience high levels of violence. The VRU have therefore commissioned Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust and partners to work with communities to better understand why and how area-level poverty drives violence. This research will be published 2022.
• Child/adolescent-to-parent violence and abuse (CAPVA) has consistently featured in feedback from stakeholders as a key issue affecting children and families in London. Nationally, the evidence base on CAPVA is increasing, however, a substantial knowledge gap exists around the prevalence, nature and level of harm, intersections between this and other forms of intra or extra-familial harm, and the nature and efficacy of current partnership responses to CAPVA (especially children’s safeguarding) at a Borough level and pan-London. To this end, the VRU has commissioned Ecorys to conduct a needs assessment of child/adolescent to parent violence and abuse across London. The report will be published in 2022.
• Communities must be an integral part of the work to prevent violence. Through the delivery of the Mayor’s Action Plan for Transparency, Accountability and Trust in Policing, MOPAC will strengthen work with the MPS and communities disproportionately affected by violence, particularly London’s Black communities .
• MOPAC will work with partners within the youth justice system to support and develop youth justice services across London, focusing on the needs of - and the risks posed by - those involved in violence.

During the development of this Plan, we have heard from Londoners and partner agencies about the serious, ongoing concerns around the impact of drugs and drug-related crimes on the safety of London – including serious organised crime, serious violence, acquisitive crime and anti-social behaviour. In addition, in December 2021 we welcomed the publication of the Government’s ten-year drugs strategy, From Harm to Hope.

Over this Police and Crime Plan period:

• As part of London’s response to the Government’s newly-published 10-year Drugs Strategy, the Mayor will convene a new London Drugs Forum, bringing together the MPS, justice agencies, the National Health Service, the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID), local authorities and other partners. The Forum will take a London-wide approach to co-ordinating and driving forward work to prevent and address the wide-ranging harms to both individuals and communities caused by drugs.
• The Mayor will establish a London Drugs Commission comprising independent experts and leading figures from the fields of criminal justice, public health, politics, community relations and academia. The Commission will begin work in 2022 to pull together the latest evidence on the effectiveness of our drugs laws, with particular focus on cannabis. Looking at the evidence in the round, and from across the globe, the Commission will come forward with policy recommendations.
• The Mayor has allocated additional funding of £2m to the MPS to provide additional resources to tackle the supply of drugs across the capital, whilst also enhancing treatment and recovery services. This will enable the MPS to drive forward an intensive and proactive approach to target drug-related violence and dismantle organised crime groups to help reduce drug misuse, drug-related crime and reoffending.
• The Mayor is determined to end the criminal exploitation of young Londoners by gangs and wider criminal networks, a known driver of violence affecting young people in our city. As well as supporting the MPS to crack down on the organised criminals preying on young people to deal drugs, MOPAC will continue to invest in programmes to better understand, target and respond to criminal exploitation of young people, building on its successful London Gang Exit and County Lines Rescue and Response programmes.
• MOPAC and the VRU, the MPS and the BTP will continue to work with national partners to safeguard young people caught up in drug dealing and to disrupt criminal gangs.
• MOPAC will continue to work closely with health and local partners to improve pathways to health treatment for those in contact with the criminal justice system (CJS), with a focus on drug use which drives crime, helping to reduce reoffending and the wider harms caused by drugs.

As well as preventing people from becoming involved in crime from the beginning, a vital element of the public health approach is working with people already involved in crime to prevent them from committing further offences. Evidence shows that repeat offenders are responsible for a disproportionate amount of the crime and harm caused by violence in LondonReference:6. The Mayor believes that stopping the behaviour of these individuals is critical to achieving reductions in violence in our city, and for this reason it is a key focus in this Plan.

To achieve this ambition:

• MOPAC and the GLA will work with partners to embed a trauma-informed approach with offenders to address the underlying causes of their behaviour to support them to move forward and help break the cycle of reoffending.
• MOPAC will continue to test new and innovative approaches to reducing reoffending and violence. This includes building upon the existing MOPAC GPS pilots for knife crime and domestic abuse perpetrators, which enable probation and police staff to use GPS location data to reduce risk and take swift enforcement action against violent offenders when needed.
• MOPAC and the MPS will continue to support an Integrated Offender Management approach in London – targeting the most persistent offenders with a multi-agency response to manage their behaviour and reduce their impact on the community. This work will have a particular focus on persistent violent offenders, while also prioritising robbery and burglary offenders and supporting local partnerships to include the repeat offenders having the most impact on the local community.
• Through new Predatory Offenders Units, the MPS will raise standards and consistency across offender and suspect management within specific high-harm priorities including child sexual exploitation, domestic abuse, rape and serious sexual offences.
• MOPAC will continue to support the work of the Drive partnership, which is an intensive, coordinated multi-agency response to serial/repeat high harm domestic abuse perpetrators to change their behaviour, with focus on increasing victim safety.
• MOPAC will continue to support programmes to change the behaviour of the perpetrators of violence against women and girls (VAWG) and will continue to call on the Government for greater long-term certainty around national funding for this important work.
• MOPAC will work with partner agencies in the CJS to strengthen diversion work for both adults and young people and develop resettlement and community interventions for young people already in the justice system.
• MOPAC will oversee the MPS’ implementation - and hold delivery partners to account to ensure consistent and effective application - of the two-tier framework for Out of Court Disposals which is proposed under the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill; making the case for upstream investment to maximise the potential positive outcomes.
• Recognising that a preventative approach to reducing violence requires a strong and effective partnership with youth workers and youth practitioners, the VRU will lead a programme of investment to ensure youth sector workers are equipped with the skills and support to prevent violence affecting young people and increase the capacity and reach of youth workers in key public and voluntary sector settings and services relevant to young people in need of support.
• The VRU will invest £2.4m in a three-year mentoring programme, helping to tackle school exclusions and keep pupils in PRUs engaged in their education, motivated and supported to achieve their goals.
• MOPAC is piloting a Young Adults Hub to reduce reoffending amongst young adults on probation. This involves commissioning to meet young adults’ distinct needs, developing a Young Adult First approach and improving support to young Londoners as they transition from the youth justice service to adult probation.
• MOPAC will continue to work with the Prison Reform Trust, the MPS, NHS England, the London Probation Service, London Councils, Lambeth Council, Women in Prison, Advance and Hibiscus to deliver the Blueprint for a Whole System Approach to Women in Contact with the CJS, which aims to tackle the root causes of offending, prevent reoffending and ensure that women have the support they need after leaving prison.
• The Mayor’s Helping Londoners into Good Work mission will support Londoners who have been disproportionately impacted by the pandemic to gain skills and to access good jobs. This will include promoting positive pathways for adults with experience of the CJS or who are at risk of offending.
• MOPAC will continue to work with MPS to support the effective management of people subject to civil orders, statutory supervision and voluntary engagement where this is led by MPS, as part of an evidence-based approach to reduce the risk of violence and reoffending.

Every woman and girl should be able to live their lives in safety and confidence but sadly violence in all its forms remains a part of everyday experience for many. Equally, women and girls should be able to have confidence that the MPS and CJS will treat them professionally and that misogyny or discrimination in any form is not tolerated in their ranks. For this reason, tackling violence against women and girls is at the heart of the Mayor’s priorities for London. Recognising the scale, complexity and level of harm caused in London by violence against women and girls – crimes largely perpetrated by men – MOPAC has published dedicated VAWG Strategies in each Mayoral term since 2010.

Continuing this, the Mayor committed to refreshing London’s Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy for this period. This new Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy for London will be published in 2022.

The Strategy – which takes a public health approach to make our city safer for every woman and girl – has four key priorities:

• Building trust and confidence
• Preventing and reducing VAWG
• Holding perpetrators to account
• Supporting all victims and survivors

It will sit alongside this Police and Crime Plan as one of the key strategic documents guiding the work of MOPAC and partners during this period.

Terrorism and violent extremism remain significant concerns for Londoners and a priority for the Mayor. Since the publication of the last Police and Crime Plan for London, our city and our country has experienced a series of appalling attacks, continued arrests for terror offences and foiled terror plots. The nature of terrorism and violent extremism has continued to evolve, spanning organised and sophisticated plots to self-radicalised individuals seeking to commit crude, impulsive attacks.

The MPS’ traditional focus has been on disrupting those individuals who pose an immediate and critical threat, although they have monitored the larger pool of risk underneath to spot people slowly moving towards this extreme threat. The timescale for this transition, however, is getting shorter and police and security services need to continue to work on identifying from a significant number of people of concern - both online and in communities - those people who present a risk to the public. It is essential that we remain vigilant and prepared.

We also recognise the unique circumstances of London as a global city and the wider impacts of terrorism on our city and its people. At a time of significant international turmoil, we have seen international politics impacting on London’s communities, with extremists seeking to sow division and conflict between Londoners from different backgrounds. We have also seen discriminatory attitudes and hate crimes affecting communities seen to be connected to a suspected terrorist following an attack in London or elsewhere. Division cannot win, and we will continue to stand up for all communities in the face of hate and discrimination.

During the period of this Plan:

• The London CONTEST Board will continue to be the primary forum for partners to co-ordinate and collaborate to defeat terrorism.
• MOPAC will continue to offer support for the new Counter Terrorism Operations Centre (CTOC) in London.
• MOPAC will continue to work closely with the police, security partners and communities to tackle the threat of terrorism, understanding how the threat has evolved and changed and how partners can work together to mitigate any risk and keep Londoners safe. This will include increasing activity against emerging threats.
• Through the Shared Endeavour Fund, MOPAC will provide even more grants to community projects that counter violent extremism. The fund will deliver work to prevent Londoners being radicalised, and to support more Londoners to confidently stand up to hateful and extremist ideologies.
• In light of several tragic attacks on places of worship around the world, MOPAC will continue to work with trusted partners and leading experts to provide free safety and security advice to places of worship in the capital. This work will continue until the Government makes good on its 2019 commitment to invest £5m in a new training programme, something that MOPAC will continue to advocate for.
• The MPS will continue to work with statutory partners, the business community and individuals to identify those people in times or situations that increase their risk of radicalisation. They will build on relationships with statutory partners and develop new ones to deliver a new education strand within safeguarding teams.
• The Mayor commissioned Lord Harris to conduct a fresh review of London’s preparedness to respond to a major terrorist attack, building on his 2016 Review, reflecting on the lessons learned from the subsequent attacks on our city and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the terror threat. The Review has now been published, and MOPAC will work with all partners to consider and respond to Lord Harris’ recommendations.

The Mayor takes a zero-tolerance approach to all forms of hate crime across all protected characteristicsReference:7, which can span from abuse in the community or online, up to acts of the most serious violence. The impact of hate crime goes far beyond its immediate victims, affecting the safety and confidence of whole communities. The Mayor, MOPAC and the GLA will continue to work closely with the MPS, BTP, local authorities, communities and campaign groups to make our city safer for everyone.

Our approach to hate crime will focus on three things, prevention – through the Mayor’s Shared Endeavour Fund, supporting victims and oversight of police enforcement activity:

• The Mayor will continue to use his position to champion London’s diversity – one of our city’s greatest strengths – promote integration and stand in solidarity with all of London’s diverse communities against hatred and abuse.
• MOPAC will ensure that victims of hate crime receive the specialist support that best meets their needs.
• MOPAC will work with partners to build community confidence and resilience to stand together against hate.
• MOPAC will work with CJS agencies to develop the evidence base for what works in addressing the behaviour of hate crime offenders, its causes and the impact on victims and communities.
• The MPS will continue to work with the communities most affected by hate crime both on- and off-line through its Independent Advisory Groups, as it seeks to increase the percentage of hate crimes solved and improve the satisfaction of victims. Over this term, the MPS will work to identify and eliminate barriers to reporting, improve training and awareness of hate crime issues and improve justice outcomes.
• TfL, BTP and the MPS will continue to take a zero-tolerance approach to all forms of hate crime and abuse on the transport network to ensure customers and staff are safe, feel safe and have the confidence to report any incident knowing that it will be taken seriously and investigated.
  

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In our system of policing by consent, the public entrust police officers with powers – including powers to use force or deprive someone of their liberty - to help keep us safe. Trust and confidence are therefore essential to the police’s ability to do their job, but over recent years, public confidence in the MPS has been declining. The most recent dataReference:8 from the Public Attitude Survey (PAS) shows that 51% of Londoners thought the Police do an excellent or good job locally in the 12 months to December 2021 - the lowest recorded level ever measured via the PAS. In December 2017, the figure was at 68%. Londoners’ trust in the MPS over the same period has also declined, from 88% in the rolling 12 months to June 2017 to 76% in the rolling 12 months to December 2021.

Moreover, evidence shows significant disproportionality in levels of trust and confidence in policing between different groups of Londoners. 50% of Black Londoners agree that the police treat them fairly (14 percentage points lower than the MPS average) and 47% of mixed-race Londoners agree that the police treat them fairly (17 percentage points lower than the MPS average). 52% of respondents from the LGBTQ+ community agree that the police treat them fairly - 12 percentage points lower than the MPS average.

It is vital that the next Commissioner of the MPS prioritises rebuilding the confidence of the whole city in policing and addressing the disproportionately lower levels of trust and confidence in some communities. During this Police and Crime Plan period, the Mayor wants to:

• Increase the percentage of Londoners who believe that the MPS is an organisation they can trust;
• Increase the percentage of Londoners who believe that the police treat everyone fairly; and
• Reduce the disproportionalities in levels of trust between different groups of Londoners to within ±5%.

MOPAC will use data from its enhanced Public Attitudes Survey to monitor and oversee performance against these objectives.

To achieve this:

• MOPAC will work with the MPS and communities to deliver all of the commitments in the Mayor’s Action Plan for Transparency, Accountability and Trust in Policing. The Action Plan seeks to improve trust and confidence in the MPS, reduce the gap in confidence that Black communities have in the police to do a good job compared to white Londoners, and to address community concerns about the disproportionality in the use of certain police powers affecting Black Londoners. Commitments include: an overhaul of community monitoring structures to ensure that London’s diverse communities are better represented; stricter oversight and scrutiny of the ‘smell of cannabis’ used as sole grounds for stop and search; and developing community-led training for police officers. Throughout this term we will continue to tackle disproportionality and improve the confidence and trust of Black Londoners in their police service. Supporting this work, MOPAC will continue to produce a quarterly race equality audit, reporting on the MPS’ use of its powers, including for example, the use of Tasers and strip-searching, publishing this data and holding the Commissioner to account for it.
• Londoners expect police officers to adhere to the highest possible standards, and while the vast majority display exemplary professionalism and dedication, we will support the MPS to stamp out discrimination in all its forms and root out those who abuse their trusted position as officers. MOPAC will strengthen its oversight of police disciplinary processes and as necessary advocate for legislative change and/or strengthening of College of Policing guidance, to ensure the high standards expected of our officers can be enforced. MOPAC will support the MPS to increase resources dedicated to upholding high standards of professionalism and deliver against the recommendations of the HMICFRS inspection of counter-corruption arrangements and other matters related to the Daniel Morgan Independent Panel.
• Alongside his ongoing oversight of the MPS, the Mayor agreed with the Home Secretary that a full inquiry would be needed into the issues raised by the murder of Sarah Everard by a serving MPS officer, which has deeply impacted the confidence of Londoners – particularly women and girls. The Mayor has also welcomed the appointment of Baroness Louise Casey to lead a review of the MPS’ culture and standards of behaviour, and the extent to which their current leadership, recruitment, vetting, training, communications and other processes effectively reinforce the standards the public should expect. The Mayor is clear that change is necessary and will provide his full support to these inquiries in their vital work and hold the Commissioner to account to implement their recommendations.
• Following extensive consultation, the MPS has published its Strategy for Diversity, Inclusion and Engagement (STRIDE), which it will work to deliver throughout 2021-25. STRIDE has four key programmes: Protection, Engagement, Equality and Learning.
• Each year the MPS will publish a new Action Plan which will highlight the key activity to deliver STRIDE. MOPAC will hold the MPS to account to deliver those actions and achieve the changes that are so important for Londoners’ safety and trust in the MPS, and for the well-being and capability of officers and staff.
• MOPAC will work with the MPS to improve its ability to be a learning organisation, with a focus on demonstrating the change that has been achieved and communicating that to Londoners. This is particularly important in respect of complaints from the public.
• MOPAC will hold the MPS to account to respond to recommendations from reviews, Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) learning recommendations (following investigations) and HMICFRS inspections, inquiries and audits; with a focus on demonstrating improvements in delivery.
• As part of being a learning organisation, MPS will also be an active participant in progressing the actions identified by the London Recovery Board’s work on tackling structural inequality, particularly in relation to achieving equity in the delivery of public services - of which trust and confidence in services is a key component.
• MOPAC will continue to engage with London’s LGBTQ+ communities to address the serious impact to confidence arising from the failings in the investigation into Stephen Port.
• With the GLA, MOPAC will continue to engage with the Deaf and Disabled Londoners Forum to discuss and address the low levels of confidence in policing amongst deaf people and people with disabilities in our city.
• The MPS has acknowledged that at times it can be overly defensive in the way it engages with Londoners and explains its work. Whilst recognising that much of the police’s work must remain confidential for good reason, MOPAC will work with the MPS to encourage greater openness, responsiveness and transparency to help Londoners wherever possible to understand more about the work of the police and the reasons behind the decisions they make.
• We will continue to implement the Tackling Ethnic Disproportionality in Youth Justice Action Plan which complements the Mayor’s Action Plan and builds on the work of youth justice agencies in tackling Black and minority ethnic over-representation in youth justice. MOPAC will take this further by seeking to work with partners to develop a similar plan to tackle ethnic disproportionality in the adult justice service.
• MOPAC will continue to work with the MPS and communities to ensure that our police service reflects our city’s diversity by improving the recruitment, retention and promotion of officers from all of London’s diverse communities.
• MOPAC will work with the MPS to ensure that the MPS can use every opportunity to prevent, disrupt and detect crime through harnessing new technology in an ethical, proportionate, transparent and lawful way, in line with data protection legislation and with the framework set out in the Mayor’s Emerging Technology Charter for London.
• MOPAC will work with the MPS and partners to ensure that data is used legally, ethically & securely to meet the ambitions of this Plan.
• MOPAC will continue to oversee MPS activity to make the Gangs Violence Matrix fairer and more transparent. This will build on the changes made since the publication of the MOPAC Review of the MPS Gangs Violence Matrix - improving transparency and data sharing practices, and assessing the impact by publishing annual reviews to monitor changes to the Matrix population.
• Throughout the term of this Plan, MOPAC and the VRU will continue to ensure that the voices of Londoners are heard in the decisions and policies that affect them.
• Over and above its existing surveys of Londoners, MOPAC will conduct another Youth Voice survey of thousands of young Londoners on their views about policing and safety. In addition, MOPAC and the VRU will continue to use our networks to engage young Londoners in our work.

Neighbourhood crimes such as burglary and drug-dealing, and anti-social behaviour such as graffiti or fly-tipping, can have a huge impact on Londoners’ sense of safety where they live and on the wellbeing of whole communities. An effective response to these crimes by the police and partners can provide reassurance and confidence that this behaviour will not be tolerated and that those responsible will face consequences for their actions. As Londoners change the ways they live and work following the pandemic, ensuring that our high streets, public spaces and neighbourhoods are safe – and feel safe for Londoners, businesses and visitors to our city during the day and at night – is an essential part of a successful recovery.

It isn’t just violence and neighbourhood crimes that impact on Londoners’ safety and sense of safety. Too many people are still killed or seriously injured on London’s roads. Fear of road danger continues to be key barrier to people walking and cycling more in the Capital. The MPS, working with MOPAC, TfL and other partners has an important role in reducing risk and harm on London’s roads.

Engaged and responsive policing focused on the things that matter to the communities they serve has been the bedrock of the MPS’ work since its creation. Through this Plan, MOPAC will work with the MPS and partner agencies to continue to strengthen local policing.

In the previous Police and Crime Plan 2017-21, to drive a cultural change away from the centrally-set ‘MOPAC 7’ crime targets and ensure a focus on the issues that mattered to communities, the Mayor put in place a system of local policing priorities agreed annually between MOPAC, local police Commanders and Borough council Leaders. MOPAC’s focus in the period of this Plan will be to support and strengthen local partnership working to prevent neighbourhood crime and anti-social behaviour, embedding the focus on crime prevention and responsiveness to what communities want. MOPAC will provide data on local crime and perceptions of safety to all partners to enable them to identify and address local priorities as and when they arise, rather than undertaking an annual priority-setting process. MOPAC will publish these priorities and monitor this data, working with Boroughs and the MPS to support the response to priority issues as and when they arise.

Through this Plan the Mayor wants to:

• Reduce neighbourhood crimes such as burglary, robbery, theft, vehicle crime and anti-social behaviour;
• Increase the percentage of Londoners who feel that the MPS is doing a good job in their local community;
• Increase the percentage of Londoners who feel that the MPS deals with things that matter to the community;
• Reduce the proportion of people who perceive the use and dealing of drugs in their community as a problem;
• Increase the number of offenders sanctioned for their crimes.

MOPAC will use data from police recorded crime and the PAS to monitor and oversee performance against these objectives.

To achieve this:

• The Mayor and MPS will continue to support visible neighbourhood policing, which has been increased for this term with 650 additional police officers dedicated to high crime areas and town centres across London.
• Local MPS teams will focus on reducing current and emerging priority crime types in the communities they serve, including drug dealing, burglary and anti-social behaviour.
• MOPAC will use the Public Attitudes Survey to monitor the proportion of people who perceive using or dealing drugs to be a problem in their local area, in order to identify areas in need of additional action to tackle these problems.
• MOPAC will monitor Londoners’ perceptions of how well the police and partners are dealing with neighbourhood crimes via the PAS, providing performance data to the public and to partner agencies.
• Justice being done – and being seen to be done – is another important element to improving public confidence, but the number of neighbourhood crimes being solved is too low. The MPS recognises the challenge it faces in improving detection rates and will continue to develop its capability and capacity to solve more crimes and bring offenders to justice, investing in building the skills of investigators and improving the quality of files given to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) for charging decisions. MOPAC will use its oversight powers to monitor progress of the MPS’ work, pressing to ensure that they result in more crimes being solved.
• The Mayor is determined to use this term to build bridges with government and strengthen our working with partner agencies. Key to effective local crime prevention is strong working relationships between MPS Basic Command Unit (BCU) Commanders and local Borough Leaders. MOPAC will continue to use its convening role to support and encourage these working relationships wherever possible.
• In 2018, the MPS moved to a new way of organising itself locally – from 32 Boroughs to 12 larger Basic Command Units (BCUs) - in order to protect front line policing during a time of Government austerity, to improve resilience across response and specialist capabilities, and to move away from silos in the delivery of public protection. With the MPS now increasing in size once more, and in light of feedback from our consultation for this Plan, MOPAC will bring together the MPS and partner agencies to improve mutual understanding of the impact of this change and identify opportunities for improving partnership working on key issues. We will begin by looking at the issue of child protection/safeguarding.
• MOPAC will support Community Safety Partnerships (CSPs) to continue to promote partnership working and data sharing between key stakeholders. CSPs will work with local authorities and others to enable effective collaborative problem-solving approaches to crime and antisocial behaviour.
• MOPAC will continue to work with communities, including Safer Neighbourhood Boards, to review of all of their existing community engagement mechanisms, to make them more transparent and to identify accessible opportunities for Black/more diverse communities to be engaged.
• MOPAC will work with the MPS to consider how best to support and enable effective communication between the police and local Neighbourhood Watch schemes.
• We recognise the damage that anti-social behaviour and anti-social driving can cause communities, making people feel vulnerable as they go about their daily lives and in some cases, escalating into more serious crime. The Mayor is committed to tackling anti-social behaviour in all its forms in communities across London and MOPAC will continue to provide data on crime and anti-social behaviour to assist local authorities in identifying and responding to local issues.
• During this Plan period, MOPAC will convene representatives of local authorities across London on a regular basis to discuss the effectiveness of the legal framework around anti-social behaviour; the MPS response; and to share good practice and to identify key challenges or blockers to reducing anti-social behaviour at the local community level. In tandem, MOPAC will develop a series of ‘what works’ case studies and share these with London Councils as part of its work to develop a more co-ordinated, pan-London perspective on anti-social behaviour.
• As part of our oversight and policy work, MOPAC will investigate more fully the links between anti-social behaviour and drugs and analyse the weaknesses and gaps in the legislative framework on anti-social behaviour in order to provide more effective support to local authorities and the MPS.
• MOPAC, the MPS, the GLA and TfL will work closely with local authorities, landowners, businesses and residents to develop safer streets and public spaces that Londoners feel confident and safe in using, day and night.
• Recognising the particular need to increase the safety of women – and their feelings of safety – when going about their lives in our city, London’s Night Czar and MOPAC will continue to build on the Women’s Night Safety Charter, which has already seen over 700 organisations sign up to it.
• MOPAC will continue to host Police Crime Prevention Initiatives on behalf of policing nationally, providing trusted advice and support to help design-out crime in communities in London and across the country.
• The Mayor has welcomed the Government’s announcement in December 2021 to introduce legislation which would classify attacking a retail worker, transport worker or anyone in a public-facing job as an aggravated assault – helping to make sure that those convicted face tougher sanctions. MOPAC and the MPS will continue to work with businesses in London to make our city a safer place to work and do business - supporting the work of Business Crime Reduction Partnerships and providing advice and guidance on key safety issues such as knife crime and counter-terrorism.
• The Mayor has led efforts to tackle economic crime in London, highlighting the lack of transparency in the legal and beneficial ownership of companies and individuals who own UK property that could be aiding offences such as tax evasion as well as hiding the assets of those who would come under any possible sanctions regime. The Mayor has welcomed the acceleration of the Economic Crime Bill and will continue to press the Government to tackle economic crimes such as money laundering and tax evasion.
• The MPS’ Economic Crime Command will continue to target those engaged in fraud, cyber-enabled fraud and criminal finance, and will strengthen its response to crime on the ‘dark web’.
• MOPAC will continue to invest through the London Crime Prevention Fund to support local authorities in delivering specialist services to meet local needs, and to foster regional collaboration to tackle cross-Borough challenges. Over this Plan period, more than £39m will be distributed between all 32 London Boroughs and a further £9.8m awarded to projects already funded by the Mayor to tackle criminal activity.
• MOPAC will work closely with TfL, the MPS, BTP and the transport unions to improve the safety of transport workers and ensure zero tolerance of physical or verbal abuse towards staff anywhere on the transport network.
• The Mayor will continue to work with TfL, the MPS and local authorities to achieve Vision Zero for London's streets by reducing illegal, reckless and dangerous road user behaviour which contributes to fatal and serious injury collisions. The Vision Zero Action Plan sets out the key actions for how this will be delivered, including the vital roads policing and enforcement activity undertaken by the MPS.
  

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Improving the support provided to all victims of crime is at the heart of the Mayor’s agenda for policing and crime. Support is vital for helping victims of crime to navigate their justice journey, pursue cases through to a conclusion and recover from their experience. It is also vital for ensuring that perpetrators are brought to justice for their offences, helping to protect others.

During the period of this Plan, the Mayor’s ambition is to improve the quality and quantity of support provided to victims of crime, and to reduce disproportionality in victim satisfaction levels across the justice service.

To achieve these ambitions:

• MOPAC has commissioned a comprehensive Victims Strategic Needs Assessment for London, to establish and analyse victimisation in the city and to assess how well existing commissioned services are able to meet victims’ needs. This Assessment – published alongside this Police and Crime Plan - provides key insights to inform the work of MOPAC and partners in supporting victims of crime. MOPAC will convene partners to explore the findings and agree actions to address the key issues identified.
• MOPAC and the Victims’ Commissioner for London will continue to work with the MPS, justice agencies and victims of crime to develop the concept for a Victim Care Hub to better join up and transform the way victims receive support throughout their journey through the CJS.
• MOPAC will continue to work with partners including the NHS, the MPS, the voluntary and community sector and local authorities to embed and extend support for child victims of sexual abuse and exploitation. We will continue to invest in services to support child sexual abuse (CSA) victims alongside the NHS including the UK’s first Child House – The Lighthouse - seen as a beacon of best practice in this area, the Children and Young Persons’ Havens and new investment for CSA Hubs across London. This will help to increase capacity and broaden the support available to meet the needs of these vulnerable victims.
• MOPAC will undertake a significant review of CSA cases in London to understand how key factors relating to the offence and investigation may affect the outcomes for victims/survivors and the progression of CSA cases through the CJS. This will identify learning to improve the partnership response in London and make recommendations for national changes.
• TfL, MOPAC and the MPS, in consultation with the Victims’ Commissioner for London, will work together to enhance specialist support for bereaved and seriously injured victims of road traffic collisions in London.
• MOPAC will continue to commission practical and emotional support services for child and young victims and witnesses of crime in London and the trusted adults in their lives.
• The Victims’ Commissioner for London will work with the National Victims’ Commissioner and Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner to better understand victims’ experience of the police response to modern slavery and identify how it can be improved.
• MOPAC will work with Action Fraud and the MPS to ensure victims of fraud and cybercrime are offered timely and effective support, prioritising the most vulnerable victims and ensuring adequate multi-agency support arrangements are put in place as soon as possible.

Supporting victims is important but alone it is not enough. We must improve the response at every stage of an investigation so that more criminal cases are charged and prosecuted; that more cases reach a conclusion; that victims receive the justice they deserve; and that perpetrators face consequences for their crimes. Of concern is the low level of prosecutions for crime - particularly in cases of domestic abuse, rape and serious sexual offences, stalking and hate crime.

Therefore, our key measure for this area of work will be increasing the prosecution rates for these offences.

Alongside measures to support victims, further actions will be undertaken to address other factors resulting in cases failing to reach a positive outcome:

• In order to improve prosecution and conviction rates, MOPAC and the Victims’ Commissioner for London will continue to work with the MPS and BTP to identify reasons why victims withdraw from the criminal justice process; and improve support to encourage more victims to come forward and help them through the process.
• Giving evidence in court can be a daunting, potentially traumatic prospect and it is vital that victims have a choice over how they give evidence. Following the commitment to expand the use of pre-recorded cross examination nationally, MOPAC and the Victims’ Commissioner for London will continue to support its swift and effective roll out and advocate for any additional resources required to meet the demands of victims wishing to access this measure in London.
• The MPS and CPS will continue to deliver their improvement plan for improving prosecution rates for rape and sexual offences. Measures in the improvement plan include: closer examination of police and CPS referrals; greater scrutiny of cases by a senior officer; and analysis of service issues that discourage victims’ from engaging. A quarterly panel including CPS, police, victims’ representatives and community and voluntary group representatives meet to sample review such decisions and work with senior investigating officers. A rape reference group looks at key themes including reasonable lines of enquiry and the Victims Code of Practice (VCoP) in order to improve service delivery to victims.
• The MPS will continue to embed its new Mi Investigation system in police response teams, so that officers own non-serious and non-complex crimes from end to end – and have the right skills to investigate and pursue - providing a better service to victims.
• The Mayor, MOPAC and the Victims’ Commissioner for London will continue to work with the Government and justice agencies, supporting and pressing them to clear the backlog of court cases, increasing court capacity whilst protecting victims and witnesses.
• MOPAC and the Victims’ Commissioner for London will undertake work to develop a profile of stalking in London, to better understand the needs of victims, their interaction with the CJS, and the support available to them.
• MOPAC will work with London Councils to enhance mechanisms for supporting those individuals affected by anti-social behaviour and explore alternative interventions not reliant on a criminal justice response.

Domestic abuse, sexual violence and stalking affect thousands of Londoners each year. These crimes can cause profound and lasting harm to individuals, families and communities – and can recur and escalate further. Recognising the harm caused by these offences and the scope for the risk to victims to escalate, the Mayor has set out his determination to address these devastating crimes. That means an increased focus on prosecuting and convicting the perpetrators of these crimes; addressing underlying attitudes and beliefs that drive this offending; and ensuring that victims – female and male - have the support they need.

• MOPAC will work with the MPS to deliver Operation Soteria - transforming the police response to rape to increase prosecutions and convictions. Led by MOPAC, the National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC) and the Home Office and piloted in Avon and Somerset (as Operation Bluestone), Operation Soteria brings in independent academic review of current policing practice to identify steps that the police need to take so that more perpetrators can be brought to justice and so that victims can have confidence in the police and CPS to handle their case in an effective, trauma-informed way.
• The Mayor and MOPAC will continue to provide support for victims and survivors of domestic abuse, including making additional investment to increase the number of Independent Domestic Abuse Advisors (IDVAs) who provide critical support to high-risk victims of domestic abuse. MOPAC will also continue to work with the GLA, which has a new duty set out in the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 to provide refuge accommodation and specialist support for victims of domestic abuse in London.
• MOPAC will continue to work alongside the MPS, Probation, the CPS, and victims and survivor services to ensure that the identification and response to stalking in London is improved and that all agencies meet the needs of Londoners resulting from increases in stalking reports to police.
• MOPAC will work with partners – including via the London Recovery programme’s Structural Inequalities project - to ensure that victims and survivors of domestic abuse – including migrant victims and those from Black, Asian and other minority ethnic groups - can access help without fear, with safe and informal spaces for victims who need to seek support.
• MOPAC will make further investment to increase the number of Independent Sexual Violence Advisors (ISVAs) who are trained to offer interim therapeutic support to sexual abuse victims.
• The Mayor and London’s Victims’ Commissioner, Claire Waxman, will continue to advocate for specialist RASSO courts, in line with the recommendation of the 2022 HMICFRS/Her Majesty’s Crown Prosecution Service Inspectorate (HMCPSI) inspection into the investigation of rape.
  

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• HMICFRS has found that the MPS’ child protection services are making improvements, but it’s clear more must be done and that the pace of change must improve to ensure children are protected in our communities and online. While specific inspections of child protection services at the MPS have now concluded, MOPAC will continue to hold the MPS to account to ensure all the recommendations from the HMICFRS review are implemented as quickly as possible.
• MOPAC will continue to be an active partner on the London Safeguarding Children Partnership Executive. Working collaboratively with partner agencies to enhance the safety and wellbeing of children in London by supporting organisations working with children in London to meet their statutory responsibilities for safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children.
• The MPS will lead in uniting all elements of the multi-agency partnership response to all forms of child exploitation (criminal, sexual, trafficking) through the single Child Exploitation (CE) London Protocol. Through the Protocol, the MPS have trained more than 7,000 officers across policing and provided training to 950 non-police organisations such as children’s social services and the London Fire Brigade. They will continue to develop joint working with other Government departments, professional, charitable and voluntary groups to ensure victims of exploitation are properly safeguarded and families are supported.
• The MPS will continue to roll out Operation Aegis across the service. Launched in April 2021, Operation Aegis focuses on training and development across six thematic areas, including CE. This aims to improve safeguarding and outcomes for children through dedicated coaching and audits.
• With support from Mayoral funding, the MPS have created Online Child Sexual Abuse and Exploitation (OCSAE) teams on each of the twelve Basic Command Units (BCUs) across London. Through these units the MPS will work to safeguard children from online abuse and target high harm offenders and networks online. MOPAC will oversee the work and the impact of the MPS OCSAE teams throughout this Plan period.
• The MPS will continue to disrupt organised crime groups involved in criminal exploitation and modern slavery by developing intelligence, prosecuting offenders and seizing their assets - protecting the vulnerable and reducing repeat victimisation by targeting those offenders who do most harm.
• MOPAC will engage with the Home Office on modern slavery and continued reform of the National Referral Mechanism to ensure that it is as efficient and effective as possible.

• National Crime Agency data has shown that in England and Wales, young people are most likely to go missing, and that Black people are disproportionately likely to go missing when compared to white peopleReference:9. While over two thirds of missing persons cases are resolved within 24 hours, the MPS will work with partners to increase even further the speed with which missing children and adults are located, taking account of an individual’s specific circumstances and risks to shape the response and contributing to wider safeguarding planning for their longer-term safety.
• TfL, working with the MPS, BTP and other partners, will enhance its safeguarding response to keep children and vulnerable adults safe from harm as they travel or seek refuge on the transport network. As part of this, TfL will continue to provide valuable support to the MPS to help locate missing persons.
• The MPS, with NHS Improvement, is developing a 111 Hub to provide an alternative to 999 for people in mental health crisis, provide 24/7 access to advice from mental health professionals, help in managing bed space across London and assist in deploying London Ambulance service cars rather than the police where appropriate.
• The MPS will undertake improvements to ensure that vulnerable adult victims of crime are identified and recorded on its systems. This will address issues highlighted from the HMICFRS review of the response to crimes committed against older people.
• MOPAC will progress the findings in the victims Strategic Needs Assessment to better support victims’ mental health by working with partners to develop comprehensive training packages and specialist pathways within the victims’ sector and health services.
• Thrive LDN, supported by the Mayor and led by the London Health Board, is a citywide movement to improve the health and well-being of all Londoners. It works with Londoners, voluntary sector organisations, local authorities, the police and community groups to address mental health inequity. MOPAC will continue to support the mission of Thrive LDN throughout this Plan period.

• MOPAC will continue to work with partners to ensure the Reducing Criminalisation of Looked-After Children and Care Leavers Protocol has the most impact; and to identify and mitigate other issues care leavers are experiencing which may increase their risk of criminalisation.
• MOPAC and the GLA will work with partners to embed a trauma-informed approach to victims of crime and all groups at higher risk of criminal exploitation and harm. This will also include work with offenders to address the underlying causes of their behaviour to support them to move forward and help break the cycle of reoffending.
• Many women in contact with the CJS have suffered rape, sexual abuse or assault prior to being convicted for a crime. The trauma associated with such violence can result in mental health issues, coping strategies (for example addiction) and negative relationships which in turn contribute to offending. MOPAC will continue to work with partners through the Blueprint for a Whole System Approach to Women in Contact with the Criminal Justice System to ensure that effective wrap around services are in place to tackle this complexity of need.
• The VRU will continue to fund two custody-based diversionary programmes. DIVERT operates in twelve custody suites, covering all MPS BCUs. The programme works with 18 -25-year old’s, helping them to find employment, education and training (EET) via an array of partner organisations, with a view to preventing violence and helping to intervene at that point of support. ENGAGE supports under-18s and is currently operating in three custody suites working to support young people across six local authorities. Both programmes use a "teachable moment" approach to intervene in a young person’s life and refer them into statutory services and voluntary and community organisations.

• MOPAC will work with the MPS and partners across policing to examine the prevention and detection of online crime and its oversight, recognising the challenges of offending that often takes place across international borders.
• The Mayor supports meaningful regulation of online harms and MOPAC will monitor the progress of the Online Safety Bill, including any new offences which are created. MOPAC will work with the MPS, tech companies and civil society organisations to ensure that Londoners who use these online platforms are safe, that they are empowered to report harmful content, and that where offences are committed online that victims are supported and offenders brought to justice.
• With London’s Chief Digital Officer, MOPAC will convene and maintain an Online Harms Working Group for London, co-ordinating GLA Group efforts and driving forward wider collaboration and innovation in tackling online harms both internally and externally.
• The Online Harms Working Group will work with partners to understand and tackle harmful misinformation that is spread online, especially where it impacts upon public safety in London.
• Fraud, particularly online fraud, takes place over regional, national and international borders, with technology enabling huge volumes of attempted frauds via email, social networks and other channels. This creates challenges for local police services, where the victim and the perpetrator are in different areas. Given the huge scale of this problem, a national plan of action is required. The Mayor will call on the Government to bring forward a national, 10-year fraud strategy. Victims of fraud also need to have their voices heard and this strategy should include a national victim satisfaction survey for those who have reported fraud. This would be similar to the victim survey work done by MOPAC, although necessarily national in scale given the role of Action Fraud in fraud reporting.
• The Mayor will call on the Home Office and College of Policing to commission research to understand ‘what works’ in preventing fraud and highlight and spread best practice.
• MOPAC’s Evidence and Insight Unit will develop a new ‘Problem Profile’ for fraud in London – bringing together the available data and insights into the nature of fraud offending and victimisation – providing all partners with a solid evidence base to underpin our future work in tackling fraud.
• The Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime will hold an annual ‘deep-dive’ with the MPS to hold them to account for their performance, ensure there is effective working with the City of London Police and National Crime Agency (NCA), and ensure that prevention work is being driven forward.
• MOPAC will integrate the work of the London Digital Security Centre – which provides advice and support to small businesses in London to help protect them from online crime – into a new London Cyber Resilience Centre. This will integrate with national efforts to protect small businesses from online crime, supported with Home Office funding, and led nationally by the NPCC.
  

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The Mayor, through MOPAC, oversees the work of the MPS and holds the Commissioner to account on behalf of Londoners. This means ensuring the MPS is effective in its work, has the confidence of Londoners and that it is efficient in the use of its budget.

• MOPAC will provide in-depth scrutiny of the MPS’ performance in keeping London safe and delivering on the priorities in the Police and Crime Plan. MOPAC will also actively involve communities in its scrutiny of the MPS, overhauling its community monitoring structures to ensure that London’s diverse communities are better represented and can have a role in monitoring a wider range of police powers and activities.
• To provide greater public oversight over the work of the MPS, MOPAC will consider how it can provide more information and bring greater transparency to MOPAC’s work in holding the Commissioner to account on behalf of Londoners.
• MOPAC will hold the MPS Commissioner to account for the performance of the MPS in delivering an efficient and effective service, one that tackles crime, protects the public, maintains the highest professional standards and has the confidence of Londoners. MOPAC will review its mechanisms for doing so – including how the views and the voice of the community can be involved - to ensure they are robust, diverse and impactful.
• The MOPAC will oversee the performance of the MPS by using the new, evidence-based outcomes framework described below. We will also review progress against the MPS’ own performance framework which is set out and published in its Business Plan.
• MOPAC will be transparent in the way we hold the MPS to account, publishing information on crime, the performance of the MPS, public confidence and the way the MPS spends its budget. MOPAC will continue to innovate and develop its suite of interactive data dashboards, enabling Londoners to explore and interpret a wide variety of datasets about crime, policing and safety in their city.
• MOPAC will maintain a focus on ethics and standards in the use of data and technology. Data protection and ethics will be a core consideration in all our decision-making.
• MOPAC will continue to engage with the London Policing Ethics Panel to provide an independent, expert view on ethical issues relating to policing and crime, including those arising from new technologies such as Live Facial Recognition.
• MOPAC is responsible for overseeing the MPS handling of public complaints and conducting reviews of complaints. During the period of this Plan, MOPAC will hold the MPS to account to improve the access to data, quality, timeliness and learning from complaints, including implementing learning recommendations.
• MOPAC will work with the MPS and partners to promote understanding and signpost the complaints and conduct processes, raising awareness amongst Londoners and empowering communities to raise concerns when things go wrong.
• MOPAC will continue to invest in and maintain an effective Independent Custody Visiting (ICV) scheme for London. ICVs are volunteer members of the public who visit police custody centres unannounced to check on the welfare of detainees and, where needed, escalate any issues to the MPS and MOPAC to resolve. We will strengthen their oversight with the introduction of a custody record review pilot scheme and continue our work to diversify our volunteer base.
• MOPAC will continue to discharge its statutory responsibilities to manage complaints about the Commissioner, co-ordinating Police Appeals Tribunals and making decisions about pension forfeitures for officers convicted of a criminal offence. MOPAC will also continue to ensure that the Legally Qualified Chairs who govern police misconduct hearings are of the highest standard and provide them with learning and development to support their decision-making.

Shared internal auditors provide independent assurance to the DMPC and Commissioner, helping to demonstrate the highest standards of corporate governance, public accountability and transparency in the conduct of their organisations’ business. The approach of the internal auditors is based on supporting delivery of the Police and Crime Plan and MPS Business Plan, giving assurance that key risks to the achievement of set priorities and outcomes are effectively managed and resources are appropriately used.

An independent joint Audit Panel is responsible for enhancing public trust and confidence in the governance of MOPAC and the MPS and assists MOPAC in discharging statutory responsibilities in holding the MPS to account. It advises MOPAC and the Commissioner according to good governance principles and provides independent assurance on the effectiveness of MOPAC and MPS governance and risk management arrangements.

External auditors conduct an annual review of MOPAC’s and the MPS’ financial position and statements, and assesses the arrangements for securing economy, efficiency and effectiveness in the use of resources, reporting publicly on the outcome.

The Mayor will continue to support the officers, staff and volunteers of the MPS – backing their vital work, recognising the difficult decisions that have to be taken to prioritise finite resources and doing everything possible to ensure they have the funding they need.

The Mayor will continue to fund the additional officers recruited through the difficult decisions he has taken to increase council tax and move money raised from business rates into policing – which together with additional funding from the Government has seen officer numbers in London reach a record high in 2022. He will also continue to work with the Government to ensure that London is recompensed fairly through the National and International Capital Cities grant (NICC) for the additional costs that come with policing the nation’s capital.

The Mayor will support the MPS to be active participants in the implementation of the London Recovery Board’s action plan on structural inequalities, taking collective action on entrenched inequalities through their role as an employer and service provider.

To ensure the MPS can be responsive to developing crime trends, the Mayor has approved a £187m revenue contract to support technology. This contract will support the MPS’ capabilities for keeping Londoners safe.

The MPS capital programme includes around £350m over the next three years for implementing new technology and maintaining existing systems. This investment will support policing in a range of ways, including improvements in the gathering and analysis of evidence from digital devices, delivery of a new digital interviewing capability; and further development of the MPS website – providing a 24/7 ‘digital front counter’ for Londoners.

MOPAC will continue to support the ambition of the MPS Estate Strategy to concentrate on fewer – but better – buildings. This approach will provide revenue savings to help protect the front line and will release capital for reinvestment in technology and equipment to help modernise policing. There will continue to be a 24/7 front counter available in every London Borough. Neighbourhood teams will be based in buildings close to the communities they police.

In line with Mayor’s aspiration of achieving Carbon Net Zero by 2030, investment plans will be reviewed with an aim of accelerating the delivery of the three key areas in estates that have the most significant impact: power purchasing; replacement of fossil fuels to heat buildings as well as improving insulation; and roll-out of an electric car charging network.

Recognising the extent and pace of change in society – and the limitations of the legislation that requires Police and Crime Plans to be produced on an electoral term-by-term basis - MOPAC will commission expert research to take a strategic, long-term look at future threats and opportunities in crime, justice and community safety in London. This research will help inform and strengthen future Police and Crime Plans to not only respond to current and emerging challenges for each term, but also to better anticipate and begin to address the needs much further into the future.

MOPAC invests money via commissioning to prevent crime, reduce reoffending and support victims – in support of the Police and Crime Plan ambitions and objectives. MOPAC has developed commissioning principles to guide its work during the period of this Plan:

• Londoners are the driving force of our work. Through listening to Londoners, London’s victims of crime and London’s service users we can understand how to make positive impact with real meaning, from policy development through to commissioning, service delivery and service evaluation.
• We are relentless in our pursuit of equality, inclusion and diversity.
• We recognise all assets and strengths of London’s diverse communities, leading through empowering others and enabling outcomes.
• We foster collaboration and co-production with partners, providers and service users
• We use a broad range of evidence to inform commissioning and contributing our own insight evidence through reflection and evaluation.

MOPAC will continue to publish quarterly updates on the performance of its commissioned and grant-funded services.

Partnerships will remain at the heart of MOPAC’s work across all of these priorities. We are proud to work alongside the wide range of organisations playing a vital part in keeping London safe, including the MPS, the CJS, London Borough councils, community and voluntary groups, the faith sector and businesses. We will continue to use our powers to convene partners throughout this Plan period to maximise our impact in making London a safer city for all.

MOPAC, the VRU, the GLA, the police, local authorities and others all have their part to play in making London a safer and more confident city, but we cannot achieve success without London’s diverse communities. Over the lifetime of this Plan, MOPAC will work to listen to and understand the views of our many communities - from the young people in our schools and colleges, to the victims of crime using our commissioned support services and the businesses in our town centres – and ensure their experiences inform our strategies, plans and service delivery.

We have good foundations on which we can build this work; from the development of the Mayor’s Action Plan for Transparency, Accountability and Trust in Policing, to the Violence Against Women and Girls Grassroots Fund and the establishment of the VRU’s Young People’s Action Group. We will work with the GLA and the MPS to ensure that we can harness the power of civil society, strengthen our links to communities and ensure our engagement mechanisms are representative.

MOPAC and the MPS will continue to fulfil their national responsibilities, in line with the Home Secretary’s Strategic Policing Requirement. The MPS will continue to work with the National Crime Agency (NCA) and other UK and International Partners to address Serious and Organised Crime (SOC), implementing a 4P (Prevent, Protect, Prepare and Pursue) structure.

The MPS will continue to coordinate the national policing counter terrorism effort and host a number of national and international capabilities, including an overseas network of police officers which operates to understand the international links of terrorism and protect UK interests overseas.

Online crime crosses regional and international boundaries, which means a co-ordinated response with partners around the country and around the world is essential. The Mayor will continue to advocate for and support greater national co-ordination and international co-operation to keep Londoners safe online.

We welcome the Home Secretary’s 2022 decision to include VAWG as part of the National Strategic Policing Requirement and will work with the MPS and Home Office to ensure that London can play its full part in keeping women and girls safe across the country.

MOPAC will oversee the delivery of the Plan by tracking a core set of measures of policing and crime activity. These measures reflect the Mayor’s priorities and the activity and input of all criminal justice partners and reflect our requirement to respond to the National Crime and Policing measures. These will set clear joint objectives, outcomes, and performance frameworks against which successful delivery of the Plan can be measured.

MOPAC’s outcomes framework seeks to present a balanced view across the priorities set out in this Plan. This will avoid the pitfalls of a narrow, target-based approach by using a mixture of broad perception-based measures such as fear of crime; and confidence and objective measures such as crime levels, as measured both through the PAS and through police recorded crime.

A full list of the measures used and a technical note providing more detail on the performance management approach are provided as part of the supporting documents for this Plan.

MOPAC's Evidence and Insight Team will continue to conduct evaluations on services and pilots commissioned to understand their impact and effectiveness, the findings of which will contribute to our future policy-making. In line with its public health approach, the VRU will continue to commission an extensive programme of evaluation on its funded interventions, to understand their impact and contribute to the wider evidence base on what works to reduce violence.