These recommendations relate to an investigation in to the response of the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) response to a call about a woman’s wellbeing, prior to her death.
The IPCC recommends that all despatch operators in the CCC are reminded that they can set an action for police officers to attend an incident as an ‘I’ (immediate) grade, if they are not able to change the grade on the CAD.
Yes
This is Standard operating procedure. Staff will be reminded through message circulated via the MetCC Operations office weekly update. Individuals who have been identified as a result of this investigation have been spoken to by their line managers to ensure they understand their responsibilities.
The IPCC recommends that all despatch operators in the CCC are reminded that they should send CADs to the ‘pending supervision’ queue if they require a review by a despatch controller.
Yes
This is Standard operating procedure. Staff will be reminded through message circulated via the MetCC Operations office weekly update. Individuals who have been identified as a result of this investigation have been spoken to by their line managers to ensure they understand their responsibilities.
The IPCC recommends that the MPS reviews the arrangements for staffing provision in the CCC, in order to ensure that relief can be provided for all despatch controllers when they take a break.
Yes
Staffing at MetCC has recently been reviewed based on the New Way of Working, introduction of Airwave Max and a new shift pattern set to be introduced in Jan 2016. The level of supervision and relief for despatch controllers has been considered and the new shift pattern and staffing levels reflect the demand and risk management faced by staff in those roles. Duty Officers at MetCC are tasked with dynamically risk assessing how staff are deployed on a daily basis to maintain service delivery
The IPCC recommends that all response officers are reminded of the response required for ‘S’ (significant) grade calls. This should include the fact 60 minutes is the maximum time they have to respond and that police officers should not stop to purchase refreshments or complete paperwork from a previous assignment after they have accepted a call.
No
The MPS accepts that the response to this tragic incident, whilst within the maximum 60 minute timeframe for an ‘S’ graded call, was not soon enough. However, the recommendation is not fully accepted. The MPS expectation is that officers will conduct a ‘dynamic’ risk assessment as described below, and determine whether they are best placed to accept the incident and then attend at the earliest opportunity. For example, where officers have been on duty for a considerable time with no refreshment and are asked to attend an ‘S’ graded sudden death (with no suspicious circumstances), they may determine it is appropriate to grab refreshments en route, as a minor delay will have limited impact on the service provided or risk to any party.
Units often accept an S grade call while on refreshments or finishing paperwork and the MetCC operator will assess the risk accordingly. This is standard practice and if the unit is then delayed, it is their responsibility to update the controller. If the risk changes the operator will update the unit to ensure they are aware and on route. Units regularly accept ‘S’ grade calls and are then diverted to ‘I’ grade calls, or indeed ‘S’ grades with a greater risk factor. For example a criminal damage (with no apparent vulnerability) verses a domestic abuse incident.
If the recommendation is followed in full, then a unit could not be assigned to a new call until all their enquiries / paperwork were completed and a report logged on one of our databases (e.g. CRIS or Merlin). The result would be a breakdown of police response and a lack of the flexibility required to manage the call list effectively.
However, in support of the recommendation, the MPS will remind officers that the 60 minutes for ‘S’ calls is a maximum timeframe for their response, via our internal communications methods.
The IPCC recommends that all response officers are reminded that they are responsible for reviewing and risk assessing a CAD themselves once they have accepted it, and then providing the most appropriate response.
No
The suggestion appears to be that an officer, once they have taken the call, are solely responsible for risk assessing the information they have, and modifying their response. This may only be based on what is contained within the CAD message but it may include previous interaction with an individual, local knowledge or a location or prevailing conditions at the time.
In fact, MetCC provide deployment intelligence for Officer Safety Risk only through an agreed SLA whereby officers at the scene of an incident or on route, informed by the available background information and call grading will conduct a dynamic risk assessment. This has been in place for some months and therefore officers are already fully aware of the expectations placed upon them. The core of this recommendation is therefore already accepted, and implemented.
However, the isolated actions of the officers attending this incident should not prompt an MPS wide change in the balance of risk management between Met CC and attending officers.
In short, MetCC already have systems in place to ensure officers respond to incidents quickly, that the CAD contains the information required to inform attending officers’ own dynamic risk assessments, and to challenge officers if they fail to uphold their own responsibilities for the shared risk assessment, as the MetCC challenge to these officers demonstrated.
The IPCC recommends that all police officers are reminded of the importance of continuing CPR until a condition of MEDS (medical help arrives and instructs resuscitator to stop, exhausted or endangered, defibrillator arrives or advises not to touch patient or significant signs of recovery) is met. If more than one officer is present at the scene, this should include swapping who is administering the CPR.
Yes
Reminders will be sent out to all officers via our internal communications methods and also updates during mandatory Emergency Life Saving training.