Agenda item

To receive a presentation about the work being carried out between different agencies to reduce serious violence.

To receive a further presentation about work to tackle knife crime.

Natasha Gell, Serious Violence Duty Coordinator, delivered a presentation about the work going on to prevent and reduce serious violence in Wiltshire. She provided background information about the programme and set out the key performance indicators stipulated by the Home Office. Key points included:

·       Serious Violence Duty was implemented in 2023 to meet a legal obligation for different agencies, such as the police, local authorities and health providers, within a police force area, to prepare and implement a strategy for preventing and reducing serious violence.

·       Wiltshire and Swindon’s strategy adopted the World Health Organisation’s definition of serious violence and had a particular focus on gang violence and knife crime.

·       At the heart of the strategy was a public health approach to violence reduction which was evidence led and focussed on cooperation and early intervention. It adopted a trauma informed approach.

·       There were 362 knife crime offences between September 2022 and August 2023, meaning that Wiltshire had the fifth lowest levels of knife crime of any police force area during that period. 

·       There was a big difference between perception and reality about the number of young people carrying knives. The 2022 Wiltshire School Survey found that three percent of children surveyed said that they carried a knife whereas they believed that 19 percent of their peers were carrying knives.

·       Delivery of the Serious Violence Duty was overseen by a joint steering group, which met with the executive boards of community safety partnerships on a quarterly basis. The steering group had oversight of the Serious Violence Duty Grant, approximately £255,000 in 2023/24.

·       Projects funded in 2023/24 included a food truck for Swindon Youth Justice Service and the WAY Beacons project at Great Western Hospital, which had helped 66 young people with the aim of breaking the cycle to hospital readmission. 

·       The Focussed Deterrence project had been implemented in Devizes targeting 12 young people through education to help them make safer choices, four of which had signed up.

·       Additional funding had been allocated to community safety partnerships in both local authorities leading to an improvement and engagement. They had been invited to pitch ideas to the joint steering group for funding.

Detective Superintendent Guy Elkins, Swindon Hub Commander, delivered an online presentation about knife crime. Points included:

·       There had been fewer crimes involving knives and blades in April 2024 that in April 2023 in both Swindon and Wiltshire.

·       There had been a noticeable decline in public order offences involving brandishing a knife in public.

·       There had been 28 fewer robberies involving a knife or blade in the year to April 2024 than in the preceding year.

·       Wiltshire had the sixth lowest number of offences involving knives or blades per capita of any police force area and it was Wiltshire Police’s aspiration to have the lowest.

·       Intelligence was reviewed on a daily basis to identify individuals suspected of carrying a knife and hotspot areas where knives were thought to be present.

·       Wiltshire Police had a strong relationship with Crimestoppers and engaged with their Fearless campaign in schools.

·       Several preventative measures had been put in place including knife bins. Neighbourhood police teams were working with parents to provide support. Peer advocates, who had experience of the youth justice system, were also used to provide advice and had played an important preventative role.

·       A strategic approach was being adopted to improve networking and discuss support programmes for individuals.

·       Section 60 powers could be authorised to allow stop and search in a specific area without reasonable grounds, although it was very rare that this had to be used.

·       There had been an increase in the number of Child Abduction Warning Notices to minimise the exploitation of children in knife crime.

·       Knife crime kept the Detective Superintendent awake at night.

During the discussion the following points were made:

·       The Panel thanked the Serious Violence Duty Coordinator and Detective Superintendent for their presentations and for their work in tackling knife crime and serious violence.

·       The Focussed Deterrence programme in Devizes worked with a small group of individuals supported by Wiltshire Council.

·       It was noted that stop and search statistics would not routinely come to the Panel as that was tactical information. However, if specific concerns arose about knife crime relevant information could be provided. Information about stop and search was on the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner’s (OPCC’s) website.

·       Further details were sought about engagement with secondary schools, as it was noted that links with primary schools were better established in some areas. The Detective Superintendent explained that he was working with secondary schools in Swindon and discussions were taking place about how to cooperate more deeply on the issue of knife crime. He had been working with secondary schools on school exclusions and had a list of all children in Swindon that had been excluded from school.

·       In response to a query about why the presentations had focussed more on younger than older people, it was explained that the Serious Violence Duty programme did not include domestic violence in its statistics as those were targeted separately. Domestic offences were primarily perpetrated by people from older age groups whereas public order offences, including gang violence, were mainly committed by young people. However, the Serious Violence Duty Coordinator explained that domestic abuse was often a precursor to public order offences and noted that they worked closely with domestic abuse partnerships.

·       There was no evidence to suggest that efforts to target knife crime in Swindon had displaced knife crime into the surrounding areas, such as Royal Wootton Bassett.

·       When asked about the effectiveness of online compared to face-to-face support, the Chief Executive of the OPCC, Naji Darwish, explained that it would depend on the individual and clarified that young people that had committed serious criminality would each have a dedicated youth worker. The Serious Violence Duty Coordinator emphasised the importance of building trusted relationships and highlighted that many young people that carried knives did not have a trusting relationship with an adult.

·       There were no plans for neighbourhood police teams to visit mosques to reassure women that wore niqabs and burqas about their rights in relation to the use of stop and search powers.

·       The Chief Executive of the OPCC explained that Serious Violence Duty was a key part of the convening role that the OPCC played in bringing together partner agencies to tackle crime.

·       Police and Crime Commissioner Philip Wilkinson, OBE, MPhil praised the work being carried out to tackle knife crime and the Serious Violence Duty. He stated that he slept more easily at night knowing that someone like Detective Superintendent Elkins was tackling the issue.