The London Knife Crime Strategy (PDF) was launched on 27 June 2017, and within it was a commitment for every London borough to have a bespoke violence reduction action plan created in partnership with the Met Police.
With the launch of the Met Police Violent Crime Task Force, there was an opportunity to refresh local plans to achieve a single consistent action plan format across London. The refresh sought to achieve a current position statement, an ability to understand the gaps and areas of commonality/purpose across each BCU.
Three ‘minimum standards’ have been included with the intention of seeking a commitment from the BCSP to undertake the following:
CSP Board meeting agendas to include Knife, Gun and Serious Violence Performance, habitual knife carriers, community tension monitoring and stop and search as standing items.
Monthly Violent Crime Partnership Tasking Meetings with Violence Intel Briefing. Tasking of partnership services to target offenders and hotspot locations; maintain and/or review Events Tracker to identify and manage events of risk, monitor and review community tensions.
Analysis - Community Safety Joint Strategic Assessment to include Serious Youth Violence, Knife and Gun Enabled Crime (to be refreshed annually).
A template action plan has been developed to support the refresh and encompasses eight themed areas:
Each of these themes contains associated actions and outcomes alongside named CSP leads and the lead organisation/s including the Police, Local Authority and National Probation Service (NPS). The most recent template of the plan added VAWG as a specific themed area and VAWG sits within the CSPs Violent Crime priority.
The Plan explains what actions are currently being done by the CSP and what can be introduced easily and quickly. Some actions are generic across the whole of London, whilst some will be bespoke to CSPs depending on the risk in the area and the resources available to deliver against it.
As the intention is to gain an understanding of the gaps that currently exist, CSPs have also been asked to include potential ‘developing actions’ to provide an indication of any local bespoke aspirational approaches that could be further developed in time and following consultation with partners.
For the next year, an updated action plan has been provided which includes additional actions around:
The VVRAP is essentially the delivery arm of this Strategy and is delivered in Bexley by the BCSP Serous Violence Working Group. They report quarterly with ‘RAG’ rated action plan updates to the BCSP Executive Group (who own and monitor the plan), where risks and issues can be raised further. These updates are periodically reviewed by the Mayor’s Office for Police & Crime (MOPAC) and best practice shared among other local authorities.