Transcript

Okay, welcome everyone to the annual meeting of the Merseyside Police and Crime panel. In terms of apologies, we've had apologies from Councillor Booth and Councillor Powell. So, having got the apologies out of the way, the first formal item of business on the agenda is the appointment of the chairperson of the panel for this municipal year, 24/25. Are there any nominations for that role? So, Councillor Barbara Murray's been moved and seconded. Is that agreed by the panel? No? Yeah, unanimous? Yeah. Councillor Murray, if you'd like to take the chair. Thank you. Firstly, can I say thank you for re-electing me as the chair. One of the reasons I've stayed on the panel is because I think it needs continuity. It doesn't carry an SRA, as David has pointed out, and so we find the membership changes regular, but it's quite a broad remit and it's a very important panel. But I would be looking during this year for other people to be thinking about being chair, because my position is I am Deputy Lord Mayor in Liverpool and I will not be available next year. But I'm more than happy to work with panel members this year to ensure there is a good succession next year. I've also lobbied with the leader of Liverpool about getting an SRA for this panel. I think that falls on the individual LAs, and therefore it might be something other members push to pursue. I think that's required really to get that steady continuity that's required. Further, I want to just say a huge thank you yet again to David and the team for the support they give us, and I just thought that presentation was excellent. I'm so pleased when I realised there was a paper copy of the slides to take away because I came in a bit late. Righto, I have to give apologies because I'm only here until quarter past twelve because I have to be at the fire authority. No, quarter past eleven, sorry, I have to be at the fire authority at twelve o'clock because I've got two AGMs over there. But hopefully we can get the business working here first and then, is it concluding a bit further? Yes, continued induction afterwards. And I think the induction is great, and while James is here, one of the things you might want to do is get a date in the diary to visit Mather Avenue to get that kind of overview from the PCC's office, which I think members have welcomed and find as an excellent piece. It's difficult until you've had that really to understand how broad the remit is, and I think other members who've been have really welcomed it and they've got a lot out of that and it does help. And it also helps you with the formulation of the questions. There is a tricky dance you have to do, formulating the questions you want sometimes, but you can. It is doable. First piece of business I have to do today is take nominations for Deputy Chair, please. Brian Tadeo. And we have a seconder. Is that unanimous? It's agreed. Thank you, Brian, well done. Brian is, as David has already said, is our independent member and we currently have a vacancy which has been vacant for over twelve months. We will need, I think, to really push on getting that vacancy filled. We have tried advertising and sharing it with so many people, but it's still not filled. So what I suggest is, let's get the general election out of the way and at our next formal meeting, in the pre-meeting, if we could, David, put ten minutes aside to discuss what more we can do to really push that and try and get that role filled. Because the independence is the balance. We're all political and I think we do need that balance and I think you need two for this reason. If one can't make it, it's more likely you have at least one independent member present. Happy to bring an item to your next formal meeting in relation to what's being done up till now, so you have an idea of what's being done in terms of that recruitment chair. I'm conscious that we did have a draft schedule of meetings which included a meeting on the 4th of July, which you'll probably appreciate. We have been consulting with you on an alternative. We'll get a confirmed date in relation to that. But, chair, I'd suggest with members' agreement that we bring a formal item to that actual meeting on the rescheduled date, if that's okay, chair. I think that's more than okay. I think that actually then captures it, doesn't it, for us. And if we could just put our thinking caps on between now and then about how we might potentially drum up interest. I know what I did last year was I sent it to our CitySafe team because they already have independent people. But it's that kind of thinking. We just need to think a little bit outside of the box where people have probably shown some interest in policing issues. They may be more likely to consider this. It may be something as well that we could put in, I don't know, various hubs like the victim hubs and that sort of thing. I don't know. But we could do more, I think. We do need to fill the post. I know it's hard work. I know there's a lot of heavy documents to read. But there are people out there, like Brian, who are interested in such things, so we just need to cast the net and pull people in. I think it would be a great achievement if we could appoint another independent this year. By the way, I need to mention that Brian has agreed to do another term, so we've got him at least, and hopefully we'll get somebody alongside him to help with the workload. I think the next item is minutes. Is that right? It's always a bit strange at this time of year because not everybody who was at the meeting is here, but could you ask the people who were if they feel this is a true record? Yeah, okay, so we can agree those. And we've also got, I think, the confirmation hearing minutes again. I think more of us were present for that. Can we agree those? Agreed. Thank you. Are there any declarations of interest for today's meeting? Thank you. Panel arrangements and rules of procedure to consider the report of the chief executive of Knowsley Borough Council. David, do you want to introduce this, please? Thanks, Chair. The purpose of this item is to give you an outline of your framework within which, as panel members, you're expected to operate this year. It comprises two parts. One is the panel arrangements document, which is set by the five constituent authorities. So that is not a decision for you to make. It's there for your information. It's the legal agreement between the five authorities in terms of how the panel is set up, how it's constituted. It is subject to annual review. The main area that gets reviewed on an annual basis is the membership element, and that was reviewed on the back of elections that were held in some of the constituent authority areas in May. It led to no change, Chair, in terms of the geographical or political makeup of the panel membership. So that sets the framework within which you operate from a constitutional perspective. The rules of procedure are at your discretion. We are offering the rules of procedure unchanged from two thousand and twenty three, twenty four for your approval. But obviously it's at your discretion as to whether you wish to adopt them in the same vein. There were no issues with their operation last year, and I'd provide assurance that they have been a robust framework within which the panel has conducted its formal meetings in previous years, Chair. So no panel arrangements document and subject to members' views. Adopt the panel procedure rules for twenty four, twenty five. Are there any questions about this? I know we have just discussed other ways of doing business, but I am perfectly happy to stay with what we do and to adopt this. Anybody of a different opinion? I'm so sorry, Tony. After one year, I find myself being an elder statesman. And just to say, just perhaps for new panel members, the although we talked about the pillars, it's the six meetings that we had and there was still flexibility. And I think I'm saying right in saying that a fortnight or so before the panel meeting itself, we are asked if there's any agenda items which we'd like to table. So I'll just kind of demonstrate that there's a level of flexibility in what we can discuss and so on. And another one is a personal plea that is when the papers go out, I accept that the time scales when things might be available. If if necessary, if papers which are prepared, say, a fortnight before could go out as kind of a part one, if you like. And then, I mean, I'm faced with coming back from a holiday on Saturday. I've got classified governance this afternoon, one hundred and forty one pages on top of eighty four for today's meeting. And so just to give us time to properly absorb and make meaningful contributions just gives us that time to be able to get a grip of the paperwork. I'm sure that's fine. I mean, obviously, a lot of the material that's presented to the panel is conveyed through the commissioner's office, and that is down to our liaison with the commissioner's office. You'll appreciate in terms of any local government meeting like this, the the obligation in statutory terms is to publish the papers five clear days between before the actual meeting. Your schedule of meetings can be quite tight in terms of the gaps between meetings, and that can represent a challenge for the people who are producing the reports. We can have a discussion with the commissioner's office with regards to whether agendas can be published earlier. I am not convinced that that is going to be something that is easily achievable, but we can certainly have that conversation. Thanks David. I do think it helps because most of us will be attending lots of meetings with lots of very thick sets of papers, and that's a lot of reading. Like emails, if you are actually in meetings, you can't be reading or answering emails, so you get to a ridiculous situation where, say for example, like today I've got meetings all day long, I probably will never look at the emails I received today because by tomorrow it's another set. But reading to do good scrutiny is absolutely crucial, so James if you could also take that away. It can't always be done, some information is constrained, but where it can be, if we could have it earlier, that would be really useful. Thank you. Item 6. Oh, we did adopt, didn't we, the procedures, by the way? We did. We did, OK. Procedure for handling complaints against the Medicine, Police and Crime Commissioner and the Deputy Police and Crime Commissioner. We have discussed this in some detail this morning, but David, do you want to talk us through it again, please? Thanks, Chair. One of the panel's statutory responsibilities is to handle and deal with complaints, qualifying complaints that relate to the personal conduct or behaviour of the Commissioner and any appointed deputy. From very early on in the panel's life in 2013, the panel delegated that responsibility to the host authority's monitoring officer, and that's been an arrangement that's been in place now for just over 11 years. The procedure that is attached to this item today seeks you to reaffirm that delegation and seeks your approval to agreeing to the procedure that has been in place unchanged since 2017. In terms of its operation, we usually provide a twice yearly update in terms of how the host authority is fulfilling that responsibility on your behalf. Ultimately, it is the panel's responsibility, but we feel that the procedure has operated effectively in previous years and that we put that procedure before you for your approval again today. Part of the procedure also makes provision for a complaints subcommittee, so there are constrained sorts of circumstances in which your complaints subcommittee might be considered to be needed to be held to deal with a complaint at a certain stage. We've had six panel members appointed to that membership last year. The subcommittee hasn't met for a number of years and it is only there for use if need be. The panel membership has obviously changed since last year, so there are a number of panel members who were nominated to serve on that subcommittee last year who are no longer panel members. For those panel members who have returned to the panel, there's yourself, chair, and there's Brian as the independent co-operative member who were on last year's subcommittee. There's also Councillor Powell, not clear as to whether she would want to be nominated to serve on it again, but subject to Councillor Powell's view on it, there are three places that would be available. One of them to ensure political balance would need to be not a Labour Councillor, so I'm conscious that we have two non-labour Councillors present today and one who has submitted apologies. I think in view of that, chair, whilst we would be happy to get expressions of interest from anyone who would want to put themselves forward today, we'd probably be better trying to deal with that offline to make sure we got a view from the other opposition member and a collective view between you in terms of who would be best to serve on that subcommittee if required. So my suggestion in relation to that is that we will email the members of the panel after this meeting and seek expressions of interest or confirmation of expressions of interest in terms of serving on that subcommittee. Is that an appropriate approach in the circumstances? I was going to suggest that myself, so yes, and I think if we can again have an item in the pre-meeting, if there's more than one, if we have to go to a vote we can deal with all of that then we can actually pin it down. Does that make sense? Yeah, and are you happy for that to be delegated outside of the formal meeting in terms of confirmation of membership, perhaps in consultation with yourself, chair? Yeah, that would do. That would certainly do for me. Is that alright for everybody? It's one of those, isn't it? You may never need to sit as a subcommittee, but if you did arise, and if we didn't have one, it would arise, wouldn't it? You know how things work. It's never straightforward if you try to keep it simple. So yeah, let's do that. Let's get this subcommittee with some new names on it with the proper balance that's required. David, please. And I had something I wanted to ask about this. And I was happy to agree that the complaints procedure in its entirety, chair. Yeah, so we have looked at this in some detail, yes. Okay, thank you, chair. You just mentioned then, David, whether or not we're happy to approve the complaints procedure. I wanted to ask about section 9, please, title making complaints about the PCC or any deputy PCC and 9.1 where it refers to a member of the public being requested to submit in writing any complaint about the comments and so on. Bearing in mind the discussion we had before the meeting about some people really struggling with writing, is there any room to include a section here about the support that could be given or any signposting that could be given to people who do express difficulties with writing or submitting a complaint in written form? Yeah, happy to respond, I think that is a really helpful suggestion. And I think in terms of the challenge that we have faced with particular examples of having to deal with individuals who may encounter those difficulties. I think to have an explicit reference to reasonable adjustments being available should they be required, I think would be helpful to add in there. So again, if you're happy to delegate that to us, is that something that the membership would want to see brought back to them or is that something that you're happy for us to... No, go ahead and do that, I think that one's straightforward. It's about accessibility, isn't it, and I think people are challenged, there are people who have difficulty writing. They also have difficulty sometimes thinking about the points they wish to raise and it would be an opportunity for officers to also help them at that stage. Is that appropriate? Is it not appropriate? So in some ways it would stop time wasting because a lot of the errors around this are time wasting because people are doing pieces of work with stuff that shouldn't be submitted in the first place because it's not appropriate. Does that make sense? You alright with that, David? The other point I'd make is I'd just draw attention to in the past, Gemma Jones is actually the monitoring officer for Knowsley and if you did receive emails that you didn't think were right, just please forward them to her and David. Because I do find they're very, very efficient at managing things and they know more than we know usually about what's around in these cases. Please do not suffer in silence or feel you have to respond. Check with the officers first. Is that alright, David? Anything else on this that we're happy to accept? Subject to that amendment, yeah. Yes, and I think that's a welcome amendment. So that's unanimous as well. Thank you everybody. Item 7. Do we have any other business or any business of an urgent nature? I'm not aware of anything. David? It's just for the avoidance of doubt, really, more than anything else in clarification. So members of the panel, sorry, the subcommittee, in order, and I'm thinking more in terms of health and safety, really. So I understand that there was one particular vexatious complaint that was then circulated and then the members of the panel were then involved in that. So my preference would be to be part of the, particularly for the first part of the subcommittee, but it would have to be, there'd have to be a way that our details for people to contact, which is wrong anyway for them to contact individual members of any complainant. For the public record, for not to have our particular details available on the authorities' websites, we are members of a particular crime panel on a subcommittee as well, so has that ever been considered, Chair? I don't think it has, and I don't think that in itself is problematic. I think when you go on to the Knowsley's website and you look at the panel, we're all stated and it's stated which authorities we are at. It's very easy for anybody looking at that then to trace back, so for example in the case of Liverpool, go on to the Liverpool website and look up local councillors and use our names and they will get our email from us. In some cases, until very recently, I know my personal address was posted, I never had a problem with publishing it, but in Liverpool we have recently insisted because of younger female members that no addresses are in the public domain, though they are on record because they have to be for elections, etc. I think there's a limit to what you can do, Lawrence, about email addresses and this is why I'm saying if you get an email, and it's so easy to think I need to respond to this because I'm a member of this panel, please don't. Check out first, get advice, and it may be a case they come back and say oh yes, you can reply to that if you wish, but don't make the mistake of replying before you seek advice is what I'm saying because it can get into a very difficult position. In the case of the person I referred to earlier, she was very accommodating when that person emailed her and we weren't alerted to it until it had already started becoming a problem. So yeah, that's why we're saying at the very start, seek advice from the officers, they will know who the names are, if the name resonates, they will advise you accordingly. If it's a genuine enquiry, they will also advise you accordingly. Is that right, David? Yeah, Chair, just in terms of member's details on the website, just to confirm what the Chair said, in terms of the panel's pages on the NOESY website, your details are not available. Your name is there, but there is no link to your details. Your conversation in relation to your details being publicly available is one that you need to have with your own authority and in terms of what detail they put on the website. It will be probably a judgement that your own authority's monitoring officer will be expected to make in terms of whether there is a consideration that certain information is sensitive and therefore should not be publicly available. Now that could be your personal address or contact details, but that, as I say, would be a recommendation that you would need to have that conversation within your own authority in terms of what is shared on your own authority website. And in terms of the comments regarding dealing with correspondence relating to complaints, with the agreement of the panel today, you've reaffirmed the delegation of your complaints and responsibilities to the host authority's monitoring officer and the team that supports her. So you should feel under no obligation to respond directly to anything that purports to be a complaint that falls within the panel's meme. It would be a matter of referring it to the monitoring officer to handle on the panel's behalf. That's not to say you have a discretion in terms of your role outside of the panel. We're not dictating to you in terms of your role outside of the panel. You can make your own choice in terms of how you may wish to engage with members of the public in relation to issues that they may raise with you. But in terms of the exercise of the panel's responsibilities and you being a member of the panel, our strong advice would be to refer anything that purports to be a complaint through to the monitoring officer and her team. Is that okay, Chair? That's great, David. Thank you. And you know, if in doubt, just ask. It's just one of those who get great support and they don't mind if we ask questions and especially new members, there's no such thing as a daft question. You know, it's complicated. It's a very complicated piece of business really, scrutinising, scrutinising. It gets complicated. There's not any other business. Can we call this to a close? And we're all happy with that. And then it's the second part of the induction, James, if you want to come forward. forward.