Minutes of the Dorset Community Safety Partnership - 28 June 2022 (quarterly meeting)

Attendance at the Dorset Community Safety Partnership

Apologies were give by:

• Vanessa Read (Dorset Clinical Commissioning Group)
• Andrea Breen (Dorset Council)
• Toni Shepherd (Probation Service)
• Lisa Reid (Dorset Council)
• Emma Pleece (Dorset Council)
• Cllr Peter Barrow (Dorset and Wiltshire Fire and Rescue Service)
• Andrew Billany (Dorset Council)
• Cllr Molly Rennie (Chair of the Dorset Domestic Abuse Forum)
• Graham Duggan (Dorset Council)

Item number 1

Welcome and introductions

1.1 Cllr Carr-Jones welcomed everyone to the meeting, which was the first face to face meeting since the start of the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Item number 2

Election of Vice Chair

2.1 Members of the group agreed that Temporary Chief Superintendent Richard Bell should continue as Vice Chair for the current financial year.

Resolved - Temporary Chief Superintendent Richard Bell was confirmed as Vice Chair.

Item number 3

Minutes of meeting held on 20 May and matters arising

3.1 Minute - 2.1. John Newcombe to find out if the Police’s Community Tension Profiles can be made available to Partnership Co-ordinating Groups (PCGs). John noted this work is ongoing and would provide an update to the next meeting.

Action - John Newcombe

3.2 Minute - 4.5. Claire Shiels to share with members of the Community Safety Partnership the report on the Safeguarding Families Together project that went to the Council’s Transformation Board and the needs assessment. These had not been received so Andy would follow up with Children’s Services.

Action - Andy Frost

Item number 4

Strategic Priority Group update

4.1 Andy Frost explained that members of the Strategic Priority Delivery Group have begun delivery planning using the SARA template agreed by the Community Safety Partnership.

4.2 Andy stressed the importance of recognising that since both domestic abuse and sexual offences have been long term priorities, much of the work associated with them has been mainstreamed and become business as usual. Andy summarised some of this work which included:

• Commissioning, co-ordinating and providing victim based service provision in the area e.g. The Maple Project, the Sexual Assault Referral Centre (SARC) and the Integrated Domestic Abuse Service (IDAS).
• Commissioning and co-ordinating perpetrator programmes such as Up2u and the DRIVE project.
• Providing and co-ordinating targeted prevention projects such as Operation Encompass.
• Providing and supporting multi-agency working arrangements including the High Risk Domestic Abuse (HRDA) project.
• Providing and co-ordinating relevant training and development opportunities for staff.
• Running regular communication and awareness raising campaigns including linking into national programmes such as 16 Days of Action and National Sexual Violence Awareness Week.
• Writing and supporting funding applications to develop key services and initiatives including Safer Streets funding bids.
• Responding to the requirements set out in the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 relating to needs assessments, strategies and providing support to victims and their children in safe accommodation.
• Determining and managing spend associated with New Burdens Funding.
• Co-ordination of Domestic Homicide Reviews (DHRs) and responding to the recommendations emerging from reviews.

4.3 Andy noted that delivery plans would focus on work over and above business as usual or developments that will help improve current work. Andy highlighted that the SARA model is proving useful in helping to understand the nature of issues, identify additional solutions or develop current provision. Andy confirmed that work is still being undertaken on the plans but useful insights and developments currently include:

Domestic Abuse

• The need for greater awareness raising around healthy and appropriate relationships.
• The requirement to better understand and respond to the complexity of relationships rather than solely focus on victim and offender.
• Responding to perceptions based on age or gender which impact on the identification of abuse and potentially access to services.
• The need to ensure consistency with the development and implementation of whole family approaches.
• The need to balance statistical data with the voice and insight provided by those with lived experience of domestic abuse.
• Developing further prevention based interventions, especially with children and young people, to stop domestic abuse from happening in the first place.
• Developing a better understanding of the broad nature of domestic abuse incidents to help ensure interventions are targeted and appropriate.
• Better understand and respond to the mental health impacts of domestic abuse.

Sexual Offences

• Identifying and responding to the fact many victims who report sexual offences drop out at the early stages of the criminal justice process.
• The need for targeted work with specific groups based on the findings from victim / offender profiling.
• Better understanding and identifying solutions to causal factors such as alcohol misuse.
• Understanding and responding to the impact on victims’ mental health.
• Understanding and responding to the links between sexual offences and domestic abuse based on the finding that almost 25% of all sexual offences took place between current or ex-partners.
• Recognising and responding to the findings that offences that took place in a private location involved higher levels of harm.

4.4 Andy provided some updates on performance trends seen over the past quarter compared to the same time last year, which included increases in total crime, domestic abuse incidents / crimes, and significant increases in serious sexual offences.

4.5 Andy noted that there is a need to understand the intelligence better, stressing the importance of using partners’ intelligence to support the work of the SARA plans, so there is a clear understanding of what the evidence is telling us, actions to address the issues and how partners will monitor impact.

4.6 There was a general discussion about the culture of domestic abuse and ensuring there is a system in place that supports all people affected by the issue. Members of the group recognised the particular challenges that those with protective characteristics face in accessing services.

4.7 David Sidwick raised the challenges for people in rural communities accessing services and asked whether the National Rural Crime Report into Domestic Abuse had been used to inform the local approach. Andy confirmed it had, with the evidence from the report included in the Dorset Domestic Abuse Strategy.

4.8 Andy also noted work locally, including the diverse awareness raising work during and post COVID-19, and the services in place, specifically the DragonFly Project that aims to bridge the gap between those in isolated communities and specialist support services.

4.9 Andy noted that there is an increasing need to be more precise about the issues we are identifying, so we can ensure we are providing the correct response and using resources wisely. Andy also mentioned the need to ensure the system is well balanced between prevention and responding to risk. David Sidwick highlighted recent research which demonstrated the need to focus on prevention, and the impact of children growing up witnessing domestic abuse going on to use similar behaviours in adult life. Liz Plastow stressed the importance of creating a positive culture and using partners’ work to create a coordinated community response.

4.10 Dean O’Conner noted the importance of using the SARA plans to set out where partners want to focus their time, using intelligence, and to recognise the work that is already embedded.

4.11 Richard Bell asked for the timescales for completing the SARA plans. Andy confirmed they would be completed in the next few months. Richard stressed the importance of understanding the impact of the work, which needs to be clearly evidenced in the plans.

4.12 Andy noted that partners were building their understanding of Stalking and Harassment, but again stressed the importance of understanding the issue better so partners can tackle it in the right way.

4.13 Adam Harrold explained that the Victim and Witnesses Group (a sub-group of the Dorset Criminal Justice Board) was undertaking work to look at attrition rates for sexual offences and stressed the importance of linking this work to the Community Safety Partnership. Adam explained the work showed victims of sexual violence often drop out of the process soon after reporting an offence.

4.14 David Webb explained the Safeguarding Children’s Partnership had discussed the delay in support being available to victims as a consequence of waiting for the criminal investigation to commence.

4.15 Richard noted it was important that any victim gets support at the earliest opportunity and was less concerned over the investigation process. Richard noted the work Dorset Police have been undertaking to push forward being a victim led service. Richard was happy to explore any opportunities outside of the Community Safety Partnership to improve this area.

Resolved - Community Safety Partnership members considered and commented on progress against strategic priorities through the work of the Strategic Priority Delivery Group.

Item number 5

Local Priority Group update

5.1 John Newcombe introduced the paper on progress against local priorities.

5.2 John explained that SARA plans were already being used successfully to tackle local issues at an operational level. The Local Priority Delivery Group had now begun preparing overarching operational plans to tackle the local priorities agreed by the Community Safety Partnership using the SARA template. These would be brought to the next meeting.

Action - Local Priority Delivery Group

5.3 Richard stressed the importance of ensuring the SARA plans link to the Rural Crime Board.

5.4 In terms of performance, Anti Social Behaviour was back to those levels seen prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. Youth Anti Social Behaviour was a particular theme, however, further analysis was required to better understand this which John is picking up with the team. John also referenced the work to look at diversionary projects for younger people.

5.5 Adam Harrold explained the Operation Relentless Fund continues to take bids until the end of July, and noted future funding opportunities will be coming in due course. John agreed to feed back to the PCGs. David Webb also agreed to feed opportunities back to the Youth and Risk groups.

Action - John Newcombe / David Webb

5.6 John explained the work taking place between the Housing Associations and the PCGs following some challenges in resources over the pandemic. John explained Housing Associations are responsible for taking the lead in resolving issues such as neighbour disputes involving their tenants and they have been working with them to guide their response.

5.7 Richard Bell commented that neighbour disputes is a common theme that gets fed back as an issue through the Local Policing Areas (LPAs) so stressed the importance of addressing them effectively.

5.8 Cllr Carr-Jones reiterated the work taking place across the Housing Associations and invited John Newcombe to join him and Andrew Billany in future meetings.

Action - John Newcombe / Andrew Billany

5.9 John confirmed that the Partnership Coordinating Group (PCG) summer development plans are in place. Charlie Pack noted summer is a peak season for them and asked whether there was any update to the PSPO (Public Space Protection Orders) for BBQ’s in public spaces. John confirmed the PSPO has been submitted to the courts and waiting for sign off, and once this has been completed, signage would be updated locally to reflect the order.

5.10 David Webb raised that he and colleagues had been asked to undertake a piece of work by the Children’s Strengthening Services Board to look at links between sexual offences (including drink spiking) and beaches and festivals but queried the evidence base for this.

5.11 Dean O’Connor and Richard Bell explained that the issues are more around the night-time economy. There were some issues around beaches but they were not aware of any issues relating to festivals.

5.12 Cllr Graham Carr-Jones asked whether the problems with accessing in-patient mental health beds raised at previous meetings had been resolved. John noted that the challenges remain a significant issue.

Resolved - Community Safety Partnership members considered and commented on progress against local priorities through the work of the Local Priority Delivery Group and associated Partnership Coordinating Groups (PCGs).

Item number 6

Domestic Homicide Review (DHR) update

6.1 Di Evans introduced the DHR update report and stressed the challenges in responding to cases which involve a suicide due to the lack of clarity in the statutory guidance.

6.2 Di advised the group that she intends to complete a timeline/mapping exercise to look at the lessons learned across all the DHRs. This is to better support timely action, better understand progress being made, and both identify barriers to progress and find solutions.

6.3 Cllr Carr-Jones ask how we know the actions taken are making a difference. Di explained that partners continually reflect on the lessons and the actions taken to address these.

6.4 Richard asked for clarity around the Dorset Community Safety Partnerships legal role in relation to DHR’s and whether this included completion of action plans. It was noted that legally, the Community Safety Partnerships function includes writing and monitoring the delivery of action plans but it does not have any authority to hold agencies to account for actions.

6.5 Andy explained the intention to get involved in the review of the statutory guidance.

6.6 Di confirmed there had been no response from the Home Office regarding cases that the Community Safety Partnership had determined did not meet the criteria for a DHR.

Resolved - T he recommendations set out in the report were agreed.

Item number 7

Forward plan

7.1 Members of the Community Safety Partnership agreed the forward plan.

Item number 8

Any other business

8.1 Cllr Carr-Jones asked Andy to look into the reasons for the low attendance at today’s meeting, particularly any issues with attending in person.

Action - Andy Frost

Meeting dates are:

• 3pm 13 July 2022
• 11am 16 August 2022
• 10am 15 September 2022 (quarterly meeting)
• 3pm 19 October 2022
• 12pm 16 November 2022
• 10am 21 December 2022 (quarterly meeting)
• 10am 18 January 2023
• 10am 15 February 2023
• 10am 15 March 2023 (quarterly meeting)