West Midlands Police put into special measures

24 November 2023

West Midlands Police Federation chair Rich Cooke says he’s surprised and shocked that the Force has been moved into an enhanced level of monitoring.

The decision was announced by His Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS).

The inspectorate said it had concerns about how the Force managed investigations, how it makes sure multi-agency risk assessment conferences (MARACs) work effectively to safeguard vulnerable people, and how it manages sex offenders and offenders accessing indecent images of children.

West Midlands Police said that many of the issues identified by HMICFRS related to the Force’s previous operating model, and the statistics were largely drawn from before the switch in April this year.

Rich agreed that the new operating model was seeing results.

“We’re shocked by this,” he said. “We’re supportive of the chief constable and the move to the new, local model that we’ve got.

“The new model has already done a lot of good, we’re not there yet and colleagues are working really hard under a lot of strain, but it’s not in vain or standing still; there are a lot of stats that show we’re making progress bringing more offenders to justice and improving the wholistic service gradually as a Force.

“So, we wonder why this is being done now? We don’t understand it.”

Branch chair Rich Cooke is 'surprised and shocked' at the news.

Rich said that austerity, a ‘failed funding formula’, and cuts to officer numbers over the past 14 years have all had a significant an impact on policing.

He said: “Of course policing in general needs improvement. We want to provide the people of the West Midlands with the best possible service.

“But we’ve been through austerity and we’ve been through several years of devastating cuts to the service, to infrastructure, to officer and staff numbers, to training. It forced us to retreat, to centralise, becoming more remote from communities, the intelligence dried up and sadly our effectiveness undoubtedly suffered.

“In the West Midlands we’ve got an adverse funding formula that penalises us because of the limitations of the council tax precept in the West Midlands, which is no fault of the people who live here, and it means we suffer relative to far more affluent areas where money can be raised more easily.

“We lost 2,000 officers. Okay, we’ve recruited new officers but they’re inexperienced and need time to adjust and to get up to top speed, and all the while we’re losing experienced officers to earlier retirement because of changes to their pensions and real pay reductions.”

Rich said the Federation would work with the Force on the issues highlighted by HMICFRS.

And he had a message for members, praising the fantastic job they were doing.

He said: “Officers are feeling undervalued by the Government, they're getting battered by the media, they're feeling the pinch of 14 years of real terms pay cuts and pension devaluation.

“They’re working hard and doing a fantastic job in difficult circumstance and the Federation appreciates what they are up against.

“We'll work with the Force to address any perceived organisational issues, and this should not reflect on the hard-working, committed, and dedicated officers who are doing their best to offer a good quality policing service to the communities of the West Midlands.”

Chief Constable Craig Guildford said he “completely disagreed” with the HMICFRS decision.

He said: “Although I remain respectful of HMICFRS, I completely disagree with their decision-making to move West Midlands Police into ‘Engage’ now despite providing them with recent evidence that should inform a much more comprehensive and fair assessment of the force.

“Our job now is to ensure the plans we have already implemented expeditiously address HMICFRS’ concerns.

“When I joined West Midlands Police in December 2022 I set some clear priorities as I recognised there needed to be a significant improvement in the force’s performance, the number of offenders brought to justice and the service we provide to local communities. 

“It was for this reason that I implemented a rapid overhaul of the operating model and in April we created seven new local policing areas, each of which has local responsibility for responding to calls for service and investigating offences.

“Since implementing this new model, changing Force Contact and opening two more custody suites, our arrest rate has increased by a third as has the number of offenders brought to justice. This continues to improve each month.

“As a result of these rapid changes we are now the best performing force of our most similar forces group when it comes to solving burglary, robbery and homicide. The number of rapes we solve has increased dramatically, such that we have now surpassed the national average. We have gone from being one of the worst call-handling forces to one of the best in 11 months. We answer 70,000 999 calls each month in an average of five seconds and have improved the proportion of emergency incidents attended within our specified targets by 25 per cent. 

“Our data is showing some significant reductions in crime. If the current trends continue, we expect to be one of the best-performing forces nationally for crime reductions.

“Accepting that you cannot turn a force the size of West Midlands Police around overnight, and notwithstanding all of the progress, we accept that investigations need to improve further. Indeed, we had already identified the concerns relating to investigations before HMICFRS inspected us; and we now have a detailed plan which is already delivering improvement. This will continue to be shared with HMICFRS.”

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