Performance and Measurement

Summary

Lincolnshire is a predominantly rural county, with a significant agricultural/food processing sector and a seasonal influx of visitors to its coastal resorts and caravan parks. The county has a poor road network with no motorways and the vast majority of roads (88%) either ‘C’ or unclassified. As a result, one force priority is to reduce the number of children suffering fatal or serious injury as a result of road traffic collisions, and to sustain overall reductions in road injury rates. Two further priorities set by the police authority are to reduce British Crime Survey comparator crime and increase the percentage of survey respondents who agree that their local police deal with the things that matter to the community.

Phase 1 of the 2007 HMIC inspection covered Neighbourhood Policing, Performance Management and Protecting Vulnerable People, which includes child abuse, domestic violence, public protection and missing persons. The force has maintained its effective and robust approach to Performance Management, and has made significant progress in implementing Neighbourhood Policing. As part of the inspection, HMIC conducted a telephone survey of 100 residents, chosen at random. Respondents were asked questions about their experience and views on how well Neighbourhood Policing is being delivered. The percentage of positive answers to all questions was within national averages.

Volume crime investigation has improved, with the rates for both offences brought to justice and sanction detections increasing. Volume crime reduction has remained stable for life-threatening, gun and violent crime, but the acquisitive crime rate has shown a significant decrease. User satisfaction has also improved.

The force crime-recording system needs to be enhanced to facilitate the management of volume crime investigation. The force acknowledges the system’s limitations, although it ensures that these do not impact significantly on performance, and the crime information system will be upgraded in 2008. Despite increasing the number of sanction detections, the force had slipped in 2006 to last place in its peer group, with some crime categories deteriorating over the previous year’s performance. Significant progress in reducing crime and full implementation of the National Centre for Policing Excellence volume crime management model has resulted in the force improving its position within its peer group for all-crime sanction detections and for volume crime, and it is now delivering an acceptable level of service in these areas.

In April 2006 the force introduced a public protection unit to manage the protection of vulnerable people, allocating dedicated officers and staff to the different activities. A number of changes that have been implemented to improve performance in domestic violence are beginning to have a positive impact. Across all four Protecting Vulnerable People disciplines, the force is delivering services to an acceptable standard.

In the 2006 HMIC baseline assessment, the force was graded Poor for tackling serious and organised criminality and volume crime investigation. One problem noted was a lack of objectives to reduce the levels of harm caused by serious and organised crime. The intelligence investigation unit has adopted and developed a ‘disrupt and dismantle’ performance matrix to use in this area. Although it is too soon to evaluate this initiative fully, it appears to be a promising way forward.

The force recognises the need to balance financial challenges with increasing operational demand, the delivery of Neighbourhood Policing and with meeting national standards for protective services.