Agenda and minutes

Apologies were received from Councillor Will Harmer, and from Runa Uddin from Victim Support.

Councillor David Cartwright declared an interest as a member of the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority.

In accordance with the Council’s Constitution, questions to this Committee must be received in writing 4 working days before the date of the meeting.  Therefore please ensure questions are received by the Democratic Services Team by 5pm on 9^th September 2015.

Two oral questions were received from Councillor Richard Williams. The question and responses are appended to these minutes.

There were no questions from Members of the Public.

The Committee considered the minutes of the meeting of Public Protection and Safety PDS Committee held on 30^th June 2015.

RESOLVED that the minutes of the meeting held on 30^th June 2015 be agreed.

Report CSD15099

The Committee noted Matters Arising from previous meetings.

Community Payback:

The Committee were informed that a new Community Payback contract was being drawn up, and that more information would follow in due course.

CCTV:

The Executive Director of Environmental and Community Services explained to Members what the reasons were for delays affecting the progression of the CCTV refurbishment project. The delay had been caused by formal objections to the procurement process. These were legal issues that were being dealt with by LBB’s legal department. It was anticipated that the project would now progress effectively. It was also noted that no adverse costs around CCTV had occurred. It was anticipated that the implementation of the CCTV Control Room (Refurbishments) Project would be completed in January and a report brought before Members at the November meeting of the PDS.

Waste 4 Fuel: 

The Executive Director of Environmental and Community Services informed the Committee that a meeting had recently taken place involving himself, the Chief Executive and the Deputy Leader, with the DEFRA (Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) Minister. The general sentiment expressed by the Public Sector concerning this matter, was that there was a reluctance to take further action until the issue of the future ownership of the site was resolved. The current landowner was reluctant to give up ownership of the land, despite the fact that it may be a liability for him.

Gangs:

The Committee were informed that a detailed update on Gangs would be provided to Members in November.

Visit to a Women’s Refuge:

It was noted that Councillor Cartwright and Councillor Lymer would be visiting a women’s refuge in October 2015.

RESOLVED that the Matters Arising report be noted, and that the Committee be updated concerning Community Payback in due course.

The Chairman updated the PDS Committee as follows:

The Chairman participated in the Safer Neighbourhood Board crime stall at the Big O Festival on Saturday 4th July 2015. Here she asked members of the public to complete a questionnaire about crime priorities.

On Saturday 11th July, the Chairman took part in a visit to the refurbished Orpington Fire Station in Avalon Road. She was joined by several other PDS members for an informative tour of the station.

A joint meeting of the PP&S PDS and General Purposes & Licensing Committee was held on Tuesday 14th July 2015 to discuss and determine the Council’s licensing policy.

A joint meeting involving members of the PP&S, Education and Social Care PDS Committees was held on Wednesday 22nd July 2015 to consider the Youth Offending Team Improvement Plan. (The Chairman was absent due to family reasons).

A visit to the Community Rehabilitation Company in Orpington took place on Monday 14th September in which the Chairman participated. Those attending learned about the different aspects of the CRC’s work in helping people to turn away from crime and improve their lives.

RESOLVED that the Chairman’s update be noted.

The Borough Commander updated the Committee as follows:

The MOPAC (Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime) Police and Crime Plan 2013-2016 had set a target to reduce key neighbourhood (or MOPAC 7) crimes by 20% over a five year period. The Borough Commander informed the Committee that Bromley Police had reduced overall crime by 16.2% against the 20% target.

Four years into the MOPAC 7 Policing and Crime Plan, it was noted that as well as overall crime being reduced by 16.2%---over the four year period to date:

·  Burglary had reduced by 27.7%

·  Violence with injury had increased by 7.5%

·  Robbery figures were down by nearly 48%

·  Theft from motor vehicles was down by 26.2%

·  Theft of motor vehicles had increased by 1.5%

·  Theft from the person was down by 4.3%

·  Criminal damage was down by 8.2%

The Chairman referred to a document detailing MOPAC crime data to July 2015. The data detailed increases in violence with injury, assault with injury, increases in sexual violence, increase in knife crime with injury and an increase in homophobic, disability and racist crime. These were issues of concern to the Committee.

The Committee were updated concerning Operation Omega, which was a nationwide MET initiative to infuse the streets with police officers in crime hotspots. The initiative had involved the use of new recruits, Safer Neighbourhood Officers and CID, and had proved very successful in improving primary investigation. Data showed that the Operation had contributed positively to MOPAC 7 crime statistics, and so Bromley Police were looking to extend the initiative.

The Borough Commander was pleased with call handling response times. It was the case that 90.9% of “I” calls were responded to within 15 mins, and that 92.4% of “S” calls were responded to within 60 minutes. “I” calls are calls requiring an emergency response, and “S” calls are priority calls needing a police response, but not with the same urgency as an “I” call.

Bromley Police were developing plans to deal with possible crime and ASB on Halloween and Bonfire Night in targeted areas.

The Borough Commander updated the Committee concerning the rollout of “Met Trace”.  “Met Trace” was an invisible liquid that could be used to mark property; it was only visible under UV light. The MET plan was that 440,000 homes would use the product to mark items over a three year period. Previous trials of the product had resulted in a fall in burglaries by 70%. Distribution of the product in Bromley had commenced the week prior to the PDS meeting, with a team of 1PC and 5 PCSOs. The plan for Bromley was to distribute 3500 kits to 4,300 households in roads with the highest number of recorded burglaries in different Wards.

The Committee were appraised concerning the number of police officers and PCSOs 

currently assigned to Bromley Police. There were 484 police officers, against a weighting of 445, which was 39 above target. The allocation of PCSOs for Bromley was 44, but 57 were currently working for  ...  view the full minutes text for item 12.

A brief presentation on the work of Bromley Neighbourhood Watch was given by Mr Alf Kennedy. The Committee were informed that the origins of NW could be traced to 1964 in Chicago. The organisation started in the UK in 1982; there were currently 600 Watches in Bromley, and 3.8 nationally.

Mr Kennedy informed the Committee that the organisation was looking for a single distinctive branding like “Crimestoppers” and that this was expected to be finalised by the end of 2015.

RESOLVED  that the Neighbourhood Watch presentation be noted.

In accordance with the Council’s Constitution, questions to this Committee must be received in writing 4 working days before the date of the meeting.  Therefore please ensure questions are received by the Democratic Services Team by 5pm on September 9^th 2015.

Two questions were received from Cllr Richard Williams for oral response, and are attached as an appendix to these minutes.  

Report FSD 15053

The purpose of this report was to outline the revised Capital Programme approved by the Executive in July 2015 and to approve the agreed variations. There was a variation of £320k that required to be carried forward to 2015/16. This money had to be carried forward to the next financial year due to unexpected delays around the implementation of the CCTV Control Room (Refurbishments) Project.

RESOLVED that the Portfolio Holder approve the changes agreed by the Executive to the Capital Monitoring Project in July 2015.       

The ASB verbal update was provided by Mr Rob Vale. Mr Vale informed the Committee that levels of ASB had been decreasing, largely as a result of the effectiveness of Operation Crystal.

The “Community Trigger” had not been invoked as matters were being addressed.

One Community Protection Notice had been issued this year, and one had been threatened but not pursued.

Mr Vale indicated that he would provide further information in the agenda item on “Operation Crystal”.

RESOLVED that the ASB verbal update be noted.  

Report ES 15063

Mr Rob Vale updated the Committee concerning Operation Crystal which is a MOPAC funded anti-social behaviour initiative to tackle crime, the funding runs from March 2013 to December 2016; the initiative is focused on four hotspots in the borough. The hotspots are Kimmeridge, Riverbirds, and two areas in Penge.

Operation Crystal had been successful in clearing long term rubbish, cleaning away graffiti, dealing with high profile offenders, and raising the awareness in the community of the commitment from public services to deal with the problems of the area.

Mr Vale explained to the Committee that the agencies involved were two years into a four year plan. The results had been good, and the relationships between the various agencies involved had also been developed. MOPAC were pleased with the Operation, and stated that it was an example of best practice. The Chairman was very pleased with the report, and with the outcomes outlined on the report. The Chairman was of the opinion that the initiative should continue beyond the four year period, and wondered if LBB could re-bid to MOPAC for funding. Mr Vale responded that a recent horizon scanning meeting had taken place with MOPAC and that he did hope that LBB would be able to secure funding beyond the current 4 year term. The Chairman was of the opinion that a press release should be disseminated to publicise the success of the multi-agency operation.

The Vice Chairman stated that he fully supported the operations, and felt that the outcome had been a better interaction from residents, with residents now being more likely to make reports of ASB to the Council or the Police. Cllr Julian Benington enquired what the cost was in running the operation, and the response to this was that the cost was in the region of £40k which was primarily for the cost of the co-ordinator post.

The Chairman expressed the view that if future MOPAC funding was not forthcoming, then funding should be provided by LBB.     

RESOLVED that the Operation Crystal update report be noted.

Report CEO 15010

Report CEO15010 was the report “Expenditure on Consultants 2014/15 and 2015/16” written by Lesley Moore (Assistant Director for Special Projects and Transformation). The report was originally written for the ER PDS Committee who had requested a full report on Consultant expenditure in the last year, and was now also being referred to the Public Protection and Safety PDS Committee for further scrutiny of the contracts relating to Public Protection.

The Chairman referred the Committee to Appendix 2 of the report which detailed the Public Protection Safety Portfolio Contracts. She directed the attention of the Committee to the consultancy contract given to Osborne Thomas Ltd with respect to work carried out in undertaking a staff investigation concerning a disciplinary matter. The cost of this single contract was £10,710. The Chairman asked why an outside consultant was employed to carry out this work when it seemed sensible that this sort of work could be undertaken by LBB HR. The Executive Director for Environmental and Community Services responded that this consultant was procured by HR as they felt that in this particular instance, they did not have the capacity to undertake the work.

Councillor David Cartwright echoed the concerns expressed by the Chairman, and wondered how the PDS Committee could ascertain if the total expenditure on consultants for the Public Protection Portfolio (nearly £47k) was value for money or not?  The Executive Director for Environmental and

Community Services answered that more detail was available, but the information was not detailed on this particular report. Cllr Cartwright felt that the Committee should see more detail of this contract so that they could scrutinize properly.

The Chairman then turned her attention to the consultancy costs of £27,968K paid to Eclipse Research Limited with respect to CCTV consultancy. She asked if this was value for money, given the problems that had emerged with the CCTV contract.  The Executive Director for Environmental and Community Services stated that it should be borne in mind that a gap had been left by the departure of the CCTV Manager. It was this consultant that had formulated the CCTV contract that LBB had gone to market with. The Director was of the opinion that in this case the consultant had done a very good job. The contract had been the subject of a legal challenge over the procurement process. The fact that the legal challenge had been defeated swiftly by LBB’s Legal Team, was a testament to the soundness of the original contract process used by the consultant.

Cllr Michael Tickner observed that in all of the Public Protection Portfolio contracts, only one tender for the contracts was being looked at; he expressed the view that the contracts were not being tendered properly. The

Executive Director for Environmental and Community Services explained to the Committee that all of the contracts were tendered using an online system called “Due North”. He felt that it may be helpful if more than one system could be used. Cllr Tickner enquired if  ...  view the full minutes text for item 18.

Report ES 15065

This report was written by Mr Robert Vale, Head of Trading Standards and Community Safety. The purpose of the report was to update Members on the implications of the Government’s Prevent Strategy, and the duty place on local authorities by the Counter Terrorism and Security Act 2015. The report would also be disseminated to the Safer Bromley Partnership at their meeting on the 28^th September 2015. 

The Chairman directed the attention of the Committee to section 3.8 of the report concerning the use of local authority resources in publicly owned resources. Section 3.8 referred to using filtering solutions that would LIMIT internet access to terrorist and extremist material. The Chairman expressed the view that LBB should seek to prevent access totally rather than to limit access.

Mr Vale underlined the fact that currently LBB was regarded as a low risk borough. He felt that it would be prudent to consult with other boroughs to see how they were implementing the “Prevent” strategy.

Cllr David Cartwright declared that this matter was something that the Safer Bromley Partnership should be focussing on, he requested feedback from the SBP as soon as possible, and requested to see a SBP action plan. The Committee were in agreement that feedback on the work of the SBP in this regard, should be feedback to the PDS Committee by March 2016 at the latest.

There was some discussion as to what constituted “public buildings.”  With reference to schools it was noted that LBB would have responsibility for implementing relevant measures at local authority schools, but that Academies would be responsible for implementing their own policies. Mr Vale commented that the main threats were likely to come not from individuals using public computers, but from private individuals accessing information from the privacy of their own bedrooms. 

RESOLVED that an update from the Safer Bromley Bromley Partnership outlining the action plan for implementing the Prevent Strategy, be brought back to the PDS Committee no later than March 2016. 

It has been resolved that the minutes of the previous meeting of The Safer Bromley Partnership be added as a standard item to the agenda.

RESOLVED that the minutes of the previous meeting of the Safer Bromley Partnership be noted.

Report CSD 15100

The Committee noted the Work Programme and Contracts Register.

RESOLVED that:

(1) A Gangs Update report be brought to the Committee at the next meeting in November 2015

(2) The Victim Support Update be moved to the meeting on the 20^th January 2015   

(3)  An update on the “Prevent” Strategy (as actioned by the SBP) be brought to the Committee for March 2016.

The Committee noted the recent visit to the Community Rehabilitation Centre in Orpington, and the visit in October to a Women’s refuge.