To approve as correct the minutes of the meeting held on 30 October 2019 and authorise the Chairman to sign them.

The minutes of the meeting held on 30 October 2019 were agreed as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

Report attached.

The report before Members detailed a Councillor Call for Action.

The Councillor Call for Action (CCfA) allows Councillors to refer matters of concern within the community to the relevant Overview and Scrutiny Sub-Committee. The aim of this measure was to provide Councillors with additional powers that enabled them to respond to local community concerns which had proved difficult to resolve.

In accordance with the Localism Act 2011 and Overview & Scrutiny procedure rule 9 a Member has made a Councillor Call for Action on the proposed changes to the delivery of Community Warden Service following a staff and union consultation that concluded in May 2019.

A Councillor Call for Action had been submitted by Councillor Tele Lawal on 29 October 2019

It was for the Sub-Committee to decide how it wished to proceed with the call for action. It had a number of options it might wish to consider:

1.                    Propose alternative recommendations which the decision-maker has to consider before making a final decision

2.                    Provide comments on what is proposed for the decision maker to incorporate into the final decision

3.                    Take no further action

During the debate Members made reference to missing documents that were not provided in the document pack including the feedback from the resident’s panel meetings, a copy of the existing standard service agreement with Housing and the structural organisational chart that was currently in place.

During the debate Members expressed a number of concerns including:

·        Through this proposal the Housing Community Warden service which was solely for Council housing tenants/leaseholders would be removed. Despite the service no longer being available, Council housing tenants/leaseholders, would continue to pay the same rate as they currently do for the Housing Community Wardens.

·        it was not right to have Council tenants/leaseholders pay for a service that was being transformed to benefit the whole Borough, which could end up focused in particular pockets of the borough.

Officers advised that the proposal was to introduce a public facing area based enforcement service within Environment.

The restructure would allow for savings of £329,000 from Community Safety and CCTV teams.

The report also detailed the proposed Enforcement Team restructure. This had been launched in March 2019 with all staff affected formally consulted and in conjunction with unions. The consultation had concluded in May 2019 and it had been established that there would be changes to the service provided to Housing and paid for by the Housing Revenue Account (HRA) and therefore consultation needed to be carried out with the Council’s tenants and leaseholders.

The consultation with the tenants and leaseholders had been carried out in October 2019. The report highlighted a summary of the consultation findings.

Following the consultation and in conjunction with discussions with the Lead Member for Housing the Organisational Change Report had been agreed in December 2019 and shared with all staff affected and Trade Unions.

The re-structure was currently being implemented and would be in place by the end of March 2020.

Report attached.

The report before Members outlined how the police dealt with drug related violence in the borough.

Members were advised that drug abuse was commonly known to be the foundation of many social problems and the root to a number of crimes.

Members noted that violence, drug possession, drug supplying and drug trafficking could all be measured but linking them to drug related violence was more difficult.

Officers advised that criminal gangs were making a lot of money from drugs and that there was high competition amongst dealers often leading to drug dealers using violence against other drug dealers. Dealers would in some instances arrange for their runners to be robbed so that the runner had a drug debt to the dealer.

Members noted that the police were currently uncovering approximately 3 to 4 Cannabis factories a week. Many of the factories were in domestic properties but there were others in larger industrial units.

Members were advised that in the past the police had concentrated on the volume of drugs someone was caught in possession of to prove supply now it was smaller amounts added to the behaviour of the individual and phone records that would enable an arrest to be made.

Officers advised that the Community Safety Team often made planned visits with a drug itemizer to licensed premises in the borough to carry out swab tests.

Members also noted that there had been an increase in the use of synthetic drugs such as Spice.

Officers advised that the Met was concentrating on street based violence which was often associated with drug markets.

In response to a question relating to armed police Members were advised that The MPS firearms officers were not locally based officers, but are part of Met Operations, which are centrally controlled. They were generally tasked to specific areas of London and usually based upon any ongoing or indeed past violence profiles.

However, like all response type policing, they will be tasked to specific calls if declared a firearms incident. This decision was made by a team based centrally and live monitoring of all calls. They would make an assessment of risk and deploy as necessary. If callers state that a firearm has been seen or believed to be used, this will ordinarily (but not always) result in armed officers being deployed. How quickly they get there would obviously depend upon where they are in London.

They are well trained and controlled, and are accountable like any other police officer in terms of  their interactions with the public. They come under more scrutiny should they use their weapons.  Many calls will often result in the people concerned not being found, or it’s not a firearm. Some cases are imitation firearms which from a distance, will look real. This is normal and the officers are trained to react to what they see, which is why incidents of police shootings were low. The police remain essentially an unarmed police service

Members noted the contents of the report.

Report attached.

The report before Members detailed the East Area External Communication Action Plan 2020-2021.

The plan detailed the way that the police communicated with external agencies and showed the stakeholder, communicator, communication need, how the communication was delivered and the frequency.

In response to a question officers advised the a new LGBT forum had been established. This allowed information to be informed to residents and also allowed the reporting of hate crime.

Members noted that were a number of events that took place in the night time in the town centre that were specifically aimed at LGBT audiences.

In response to a question relating to faith based groups Members were advised that the Independent Advisory Groups provided a vital conduit between the police and faith based groups. Integration also took place at youth centres and schools.

Members noted the report

Report attached.

The report before Members provided information on performance against the indicators previously requested by the Sub-Committee during Quarter 3.

The report highlighted the police response times as follows:

I-grades:

By the end of qtr. 3, Havering had seen an improvement in response times for I calls from 75.6% at the beginning of October 2019 to 82.9 % at the end of December 2019. This was above the overall BCU average of 81.9% for the end of December 2019.

S-grades:

By the end of qtr. 3, Havering had seen a reduction in response times for S calls from 80.6% at the beginning of October 2019 to 71.4 % at the end of December 2019. This was above the overall BCU average of 69.3% for the end of December 2019.

In relation to violence For the rolling 12 months there had been a reduction from 1268 Non DA VWI from December 2017 to December 2018 to 1192 Non DA VWI from October 2018 – December 2019, a reduction of 5.99%.

Qtr. 3 2019-20 saw a reduction of 3 incidents when compared to qtr. 3 2018-19, a reduction of 1%.

Work continued through the Safe and Sound Partnership to address crime and disorder in the day and night time economy. Implementation of the Serious Group Violence and Knife crime action plan continued with proactive work in schools and colleges in qtr. 3.

Members noted that an additional £50,000 had been secured from MOPAC to provide prevention work with young people through the Council’s Alternative Provision service. County Lines & Child Criminal Exploitation Talks had been offered to all Secondary Schools for Year 10 & Year 11 aged pupils. A total of 17 talks delivered in Autumn Term 2019, with a further 12 talks planned for January 2020.

A Tri Borough Violence Reduction summit was held in November 2019 and was attended by over 200 professionals.

For the rolling 12 months from December 2017 to December 2018 there had been a reduction from 1962 total burglary offences to 1888 total burglary offences for December 2018 to December 2019, a reduction of 3.77%.

In relation to ASB calls for the rolling 12 months from December 2017 to December 2018 there had been an increase from 5186 total ASB calls to 5367 total ASB calls in December 2018 to December 2019, and increase of 3.49%.

A comprehensive tri borough action plan was developed and implemented to tackle the potential seasonal increase in ASB linked to Halloween and Bonfire night and no increase in ASB was experienced in Havering.

Members noted the report.