THAMES Valley Police has set out its Race Action Plan following a summer of consultation with communities across the region last year.
Work has got underway to address concerns about representation of minorities in police forces as TVP seeks to be a force “trusted by all of [their] communities.”
During its summer consultations, TVP consulted more than 2,600 people of black heritage across 41 events and around 100 engagement activities between July and September.
ACC Dennis Murray said: “Nationally, the police have been working in this area for some time, but in May 2022 the National Police Chiefs’ Council launched the Race Action Plan.
“The national Race Action Plan only looks at those issues affecting the black community, so we have taken it up and designed our own version.
“Whilst we will take the spirit of that and deal with those issues, TVP recognised that we have a much wider population of minority community in Thames Valley.
“So we will deal with the national aims and objectives, but we also have our own local aims and objectives, encompassed in our plan.”
He explains that race relations with the police have been an issue discussed throughout his career: “I’ve been in the police service now for 33 years but we have probably been talking about this for 40.
“In the eyes of the community we haven’t made the progress that they would expect to see–we still have things like disproportionality in the police use of powers, and we are not representative compared to demographics of our communities.
“So it’s only right that we do this.”
He explained that the plan is a chance to create a “consistent approach” with “clear, measurable outcomes.
“These can not only be measured locally, but also nationally and through the His Majesty’s Inspectorate.”
The plan features four pillars of implementation: that relevant communitiesare represented, respected, involved, and protected.
“In our plan, we will look at the involving people in our use of powers so that they make sure that they are not over-policed.
“It will also make sure they’re protected and receive the right services, as well as looking at hate crimes, which a lot of people from minority communities suffer from.
“And then that they are represented within our organisation– because the best way to design these issues out is to make sure that we’ve got that diversity of thought within the organisations.
“The community will be able to look in and see itself represented in the people that work here.”
The plan follows considerable levels of consultation with relevant communities, but this process will be ongoing.
“We’ve engaged with over 2,600 people from the Black and minority community so far, and we’re going to continue checking in with the communities– it is absolutely going to be an ongoing dialogue.
“We set up an independent scrutiny and oversight board, which is made up of Black, Asian, and other minority groups, and they really threw the challenge down to us.
“They said after out initial phrases that they felt we needed to go and engage more before we finalised the plan.”
Three phases of consultation have taken place, he explains: “External, internal, and then a general consultation have given us a good insight into the nuances of what we need to focus on in the Thames Valley over the next two years.”
As to what the public might see changing in the force, he said: “One of the examples is the use of data.
“The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) said that most forces cannot explain their data– if they can’t explain it, they should reform it.
“We know that we’ve got disproportionality and there are some areas that we probably don’t understand as fully as we would want to.
“We have a dedicated analyst now, and we are reforming our data sets, so that we understand if we are proportionate or disproportionate.
He added: “But also if we’re disproportionate, is that legitimate or isn’t it?
“Which means you could measure us against the census data to say that, in Slough for example, we are disproportionate based on the 64% of minority ethnicities shown in census data.
“So we’re looking at whether we’re using the right measures, and making sure that we understand the problem so that we can fix it.”
He explained that it should not only help members of the public feel more trust in the police as those being served, but also as an employer.
“If you look at our current force profile, we are really good at recruiting people from minority backgrounds, but we know that retention is an issue.
“So when people come into the organisation, they’re expecting a really diverse organisation but when they get here they still feel quite alone.
“Now we’ve got a dedicated retention team and a positive action team who reach out into the community.”
He also explained that the force is looking to understand disparate communities more, too:
“We are currently in the midst of what we’re calling community mapping, where we seek to better understand what communities are out there.
“But also how they want to be engaged with and getting away from this term ‘hard to reach and working very hard to try and develop that.
He added that solutions and changes need to be made on an ongoing basis: “We’re not just looking at the short-term.
“We’re looking at the long-term investment here, to make sure that those young people can start to engage with the police and have a bit of trust.
“Then when it comes to the time when they’re old enough to apply that we attract them into the organisation.”
He continued: “It’s easy to write the plan, but how do you lift it off the page and turn it into demonstrable activity, and then make sure that becomes the DNA of the organisation.
“This has been going on for 40 years and policing hasn’t quite corrected this, so it isn’t a short-term fix.
“This plan is the starter of a consolidation of what nationally has been recognised as good practise and starting to build that into the way we do things.”
He explained: “We were called out in the independent Scrutiny oversight board’s end of year report, the only forced to be called out into putting this in place in a sustainable way and engaging with the national agenda.
“We’ve supported the national plan, with the superintendent, to help the national plan develop because we believe it will help us locally.”
“These are the building blocks for how we do things, as business as usual, which we are building into the DNA of our organisation.”
