Transcript

Transcript

As you can see there, what we've done is we've split the reactive and proactive, reactive and proactive use of CCTV. So 87% of what the CCTV guys are doing in the control room is actually identifying stuff outside, which we didn't have that capability before. We are now, only 13% of it is reactive and that is stuff that they may be hearing on the police radios and are then focusing in or they're being asked to focus in on a particular location because something is taking place. So you can see there's a massive difference between that, it just shows how good the facility is there for identifying information. When you look at the actual figures, you know, there was just under 1900 incidents recorded by CCTV just in that three month period, so an extremely useful tool and having had conversations with police colleagues, I think they're finding it extremely useful as well. Overall, it was 101 CCTV requests from insurance companies during that three months, so again, things like your road traffic accidents, et cetera, are being captured and there is footage so that can be dealt with. The next slide, thanks Ben, the next slide really we've done this time round is we've split all 24 wards down into the top 12 and the bottom 12 of incidents. Now it's a little bit of a different picture because not every ward has got the same number of cameras, so you will obviously have recorded more in those wards that have gotten much more cameras. But if we go through some of the statistics you'll see, so Collindale North for instance, the figures 231 for ASB, Beggin 24, Rough Sleepers 22 and others, so I've got others down there and this is just the individuals. When you look at the number there, 53, that is over a 12 week period, so they are just individual incidents, it could be a fraud incident that they've heard about on the radio and we'll focus in to see what they can see, it might be an accident, it could be a road traffic collision, something like that and there's just very few of them. So if we were to put them all on this report you'd have like 30 pages, so I've just put it down under other, yeah. With the rest of the wards you can see how it filters down and you can see what the primary offences are that are being spotted, so I know we've spoken previously about Beggin and you can see how that's filtering out across the borough and how we're actually capturing evidence of that on the footage and of course that gives us the ability to either speak to police or deal with the matter ourselves via the community safety team. The other elements of it, fly tipping is very important because obviously that's a key priority for the community safety team and when they're captured, you know again the information is, you'll have a vehicle and a registration number and a description of a person and that's then passed on to the team to investigate and that will inevitably result in an enforcement activity of some sort or prosecution. So we're getting much better at that and the evidence is now helping us with all of that too. The next slide, I think it's just the second half of the ward, so the lower reports, again it's showing you the top elements of each ward but as I said, in some of these wards there is fewer cameras than in others so you will get lower reports coming through. I mean unless you've got any questions on that particular aspect of it, this is just an overview of how that's working. Thank you both very much, I think I'll just add a couple of things, we've obviously started a fly tipping campaign as the council, sorry, working with the place team and enforcement together and there's been the posters on bus stops and that sort of thing, so that's welcome and you know it's a key issue for residents in particular wards, including my own. I think we'll also be doing a campaign around the PSPO which will be very welcome as well to highlight awareness. I just wanted to note going backwards on the gun crime and the really significant decline in that, we were on grand part yesterday, a team of us of police and council and talking to residents again, I don't think we can ever underestimate the difference that that operation has made, it's not perfect, there's always ongoing need but the difference that has made for this borough in terms of where we were a year or so ago is quite extraordinary. And I also wanted to note on the robbery figures that have gone up, that it will be doing, I think it's both teams, family services and community safety, a specific violence reduction unit supported project starting very soon, so I don't know if anyone wants to mention that at all at this point and yes we'll keep an eye on the merit cases and just understand what's coming through there. I think Fiona did you want to, no not at all then, nice to see you. Declan, I just noticed that there's a number of instances that just has rough sleeping, obviously that's not a crime and generally those individuals are incredibly vulnerable so I wondered what does that prompt, do your team then contact Streetlink, do they contact outreach workers so that they can get access to support in a timely fashion? Yeah thanks Fiona, so the purpose of it on the CCTV slides is really that the CCTV operators are identifying where there is rough sleeping taking place, that is then passed on so we will always get a report, every day we get a report in community safety of basically these figures and that will get passed on to our teams, they'll go out and they'll see who these people are and we'll engage with the rough sleeping team as well so they go out and then they can help these individuals. Does it also pick up people who are living in vehicles? It's a bit difficult for that because are they actually living it, are they just waiting for somebody? I think when it gets reported to us as somebody living in the vehicles then the same process takes place but whether it's picked up on a CCTV camera is a slightly different thing. Also just to add that we certainly from putting the CCTV in from the early figures and things I was really encouraged by the number of welfare check calls that were also made with ambulances etcetera called for people in distress which wasn't necessarily our priority when we put it in, it was very much on the policing and crime side but that has always been a very welcome additional feature with this. I think if you're ready to move on Chair the next slide is pairing with Thought Prevent. Thank you. I think as you can see the most glaring figure of the six out there is a 53% increase, almost 53% increase on the same period last year for Q1. The main reason for that is that Q1 of 22, 23 was exceptionally low. We normally get around 30 referrals in a period and it just happened that last year was quite low. Some of those that came in what you might see, also see there's a 125% increase on mixed, unclear and unspecified. Those areas will be changed going forward, I think SO15 and the Home Office are trying to understand those referrals a bit more so they're breaking down rather than the broader other on mixed, unclear, they'll be breaking down to lots of different areas. So maybe next time I'll be reporting something a bit different but some of the things for example that we did see rising this year came from those low-level antisemitism that very much were associated with the current conflict that's going on in the area at the moment. Some odd ones with a young person bringing in an imitation firearm, someone calling for medieval law to be brought back. Also we had someone referring to Elliot Rogers who was an infamous multiple killer at a multiple school shooting. So lots of areas there but if we look at the next page, the next slide rather, which compares to national figures, what we see there is very, very similar to what the rest of the country are reporting. As always, we always report higher levels of young people being referred because we are in a borough, in an area that we're fortunate enough to have a preventive education officer up until April of this year and I think schools are just a lot more aware. Just going forward though we have seen a tour, we've had a couple of referrals that have been associated with the national riots and these require, really, that the people who have been identified just happen to be seen in the media by people who knew them and they featured in papers, so quite public incidents, but going forward we may see that rise as we understand all those referrals come forward. Thank you. Any questions? I would just like to note at this point that the council, which you've been very involved with and the different teams, has been doing a review of our work on hate crime and community cohesion. We were going to be doing that anyway because the strategy concludes this year, but to co-produce and have a dialogue with all of our communities and there will be work coming up in Hate Crime Week and beyond to start a conversation and to very much highlight the strengths of this borough as well as understanding the issues that are out there, too. Thank you. I can't see any questions online, either, and I'm also aware that some people online are in the room, too, which is a bit confusing as well. Hello, Chris. So, I think that's it on these slides then and we move on to, sorry, Claire's about to tell me we need to note them, so we've noted the slides and thank everyone for their contribution and their work. That takes us on to, I think, the more detailed update verbally from the Northwest BCU Police, if that's okay. I'm a bit confused with the mics as well today, so I think we're moving on, if you've got anything verbally to update at this point. Yeah, that's fine. Great. Okay, so we'll take that and we've had your update within the slides. Thank you. That takes us on to item nine and before we start the family services update, I would like to thank and note for the whole team the really good Ofsted review, including outstanding in one of the categories, we are really proud of the work that's done and thank the team very much. Sorry, I'm having a bit of mic trouble. Okay, so you have the report, so I won't go through it in incredible detail, but just pick out some of the key highlights from the domestic, we'll start with the domestic abuse report. Sorry, I'm having some IT challenges this morning, so I'm going flicking through paper. Please excuse the noise if it's making on the mic. So you'll see on page four that we're halfway through most of our objectives in the domestic abuse and violence against women and girls strategy, we have about a quarter of our actions in progress and then we have about 20% where we are expecting them to start this year. So those actions are expected to be finalized by the end of March 2025 and that will coincide with the development of our new strategy for domestic abuse and vogue that we are starting consultation on now which will run from 2025 to 2028. So just in terms of the rates, we've just seen the police rates on the domestic abuse, but we are the fourth, we're showing as the fourth lowest rate in London in terms of reported domestic abuse incidents, but we're also showing as the third highest rate in London for positive outcome rates, which used to be known as the sanction and detection rates, so that's positive news for VARNET. We've seen some fluctuations in domestic abuse referrals in terms of volume, but I'll come to that in a minute. We've been running some really successful children's groups and we've modified them, so these groups are for parents and for children to help them overcome their experiences with domestic abuse and hopefully break cycles of future generational abuse and they're delivered through our early help services. Training has continued throughout the quarter, still well attended and we've got some feedback in the report about some of the people that have accessed some of our courses as well. Just on the IRIS program, I think important to note on the IRIS program, we still don't have sign up from a group of GPs and it's been three years now that we've not been able to engage those GPs in that sign up. I suppose we're going to be doing a bit more analysis on whether or not we're still getting referrals from those GP surgeries, because I think that's what we don't know, so we can see the GP surgeries and their volumes of referrals coming in. We have seen a reduction of I think it's 13% in quarter one of referrals from GPs, but that's kind of in line with the reduction in referrals for domestic abuse across the board. So we don't know if that's specific to GPs, but we are going to take a closer look at that for quarter two. The Victim and Prisoners Act 2024 received a Royal Assent in May 2024 and that now places a statutory responsibility on police forces to share information with schools about domestic abuse incidents, that's Operation Encompass, and we're working with schools and the police to make sure that that's implemented. As the chair, Councillor Conway, has just noted, there's a note in here about the feedback from the Ofsted Inspection of Local Authority Children's Services that we had in June and they recognised that the MARIC was working well and that social workers in our Children and Family Services understand the domestic abuse impact on children and that it's clearly articulated in assessments and that we're working as an organisation to help parents overcome their experiences of abuse. The MARIC referrals, we've seen a reduction of 30%, quite a significant reduction in MARIC referrals in quarter one, or actually it's over the last 12 months, not quarter one, but again it's synonymous with all the other reductions that we're seeing and we're just interested to know why that's happening. Sixty-one percent of our MARIC referrals are around physical violence in the relationship, which is linked to the high-risk nature of the MARIC in any event. So we have prevention fund that's enabling us to deliver some training and we've been doing workshops for practitioners and residents and partner organisations around hate crime involved and there's a little case study in there about the work that was done with resources for autism and Barnet Mencap. We have 20 professionals and volunteers attend that, so that's positive and we'll continue rolling those out. Some case studies in there from victims and I think what they're doing is highlighting the courses that we are running for victims and survivors, that they're having an impact, that they're helping women feel safer and to develop confidence to hopefully not go into, to stay safe from abusive relationships and hopefully not repeat those cycles of victimisation. So we've invited SOLIS because of the reduction in referrals and we've also seen a reduction in the uptake. So the number of women or victims that have referred to SOLIS for help and support, there's a large percentage in this quarter of cases being declined and we're curious about why that is. So we've invited them to come to the quarter two, that will be reported in quarter two, they'll be coming to the next form called to help us understand the rationale behind their decision making for referrals. Good to note that we've had a fourth Barnet Refuge open, it's been opened by the Iranian Kurdish Women's Rights Organisation, has eight bed spaces for single Middle Eastern, North African and Afghan women who are fleeing domestic abuse, so really positive to see that additional resource in the borough. I think the one stop shop, we're still seeing good multi-agency working through the one stop shop and we're still seeing good footfall through that service and it's, we can see that the links to housing, the links to temporary accommodation, I think they're a bit of a challenge. I don't think we have housing colleagues here today, but that's a bit of a challenge because lots of women who are fleeing domestic abuse want to leave, want to stay in their local area, and we don't have properties in the area to enable them to stay, I feel like we should all stand up for something. So we are, so we're working with housing to have a look at how we can determine priority around those women and children that need to stay in the borough and those that could move out of the borough, but we're also considering ideas around perpetrators leaving the property and making sure that they're the ones that are going to TA rather than children, causing more disruption. Okay, so the perpetrator programme, so the CIFA programme, we've only got funding until, it's been very successful in rolling that out across the other ten boroughs, really good partnership working there, unfortunately we don't have agreement for funding beyond March 2025 at this point, so it will be a shame to lose that provision, it's really making a difference and every time we hear from perpetrators who are using the programme they give such strong and positive feedback about the way that it's considering domestic abuse in a cultural context, so we hope after the autumn budget statement that we might get some news on potential funding for next year, but maybe I'm being optimistic. So you can see here in the report that the volume of domestic violence prevention notices and domestic violence prevention orders that have been granted and the number of Claire's Law disclosures and outcomes and that's on a steady pace. As you know we've launched the Safe Haven pilot in March and we are now at the point of review, so that's been live for six months now, so we're having a review of how that's working, so we're linking with those three premises that have the Safe Haven tools and stickers to look at what impact that's having, whether people are aware of what it is and whether people are using it and whether there's a need for us to roll that out in the premises across the rest of the borough, so that's happening now, that review. Any questions on domestic abuse involved before I move on to reducing offending? Sorry, if I could just say a couple of things. One is I think it would be really helpful for councillors to understand with solace and why certain things aren't being progressed because, sorry I know myself I refer residents there, so I think that would be really helpful to have some sort of communication back on that. In terms of the Safe Haven assessment, I think we agreed that we'd do that through the winter period because we think that there might be more take-up starting to happen as it gets darker earlier. In terms of CIFA, the administration very strongly supports its continuation and if there's any sort of letter of communication you need from the chair, I'm very happy to do that. And lastly, I would suggest maybe Barnet Homes when they're next here if they can give us an update on how the accreditation process is going, I think would be helpful if we could note that. Yeah, thank you very much. Does anyone have any questions or comments on this section? No? Okay, thank you. So just on to reducing offendings, so in similarity, the Youth Justice Plan also does feel like a good time to be updating strategies at the moment, so the Youth Justice Plan is, we've just produced our annual report for last year that was taken to the overview and scrutiny committee, and we are now working on developing our Youth Justice Plan for 2025 to 2026 or 7. That will be in production. It will need to go to full council for sign-off next year, so we'll be working with partners to develop that. So we're in year two of our current strategy and this report provides an update on 4-1. I mean, it's all pretty positive in as much as Barnet's first-time entrant rates is lower than London and the national averages, our reoffending rates are lower than London and the national averages, and our custody rates are also lower, so the Barnet Youth Offending Service is doing a pretty good job on supporting young people to stay out of the criminal justice system through their out-of-court disposals and prevention programmes, and also to make sure that when those young people are coming into the system that we reduce the risk of recidivism for those young people. So it's a pretty positive story, so in the quarter one, Youth Justice Management Board, we focused on tackling disproportionality. It's acknowledged that we have disproportionality in our youth justice cohort. We - you can see from the data that we've got on page 18, which is about the young people's arrest and disposal statistics, and overwhelmingly we see a larger proportion of young black males. The stop and search is starting to improve, those numbers are going down, but the arrest is still higher. What we don't understand is what happens at charge, so we can't see where the - if there's disparity at the charging point, so we know that we have more young black people arrested, but do they get the same outcomes at the point of charging? So we've asked the Youth Justice Police to help us try and understand that picture a little bit clearer, but we can see through the report that they are more likely to be charged for an offence and less likely to be handed down an out-of-court disposal. So we do know that, but what we can't see is the tariff of offending, so we can't see whether black boys are just being arrested for more serious crimes and therefore are not appropriate for out-of-court disposals, so that's a further piece of work that the Youth Justice Board and partners will be completing. So we know already we've tackled - we've spent a lot of time as a partnership tackling exclusions of black boys from education, and we've been able to bring that number down. So we knew back in 2021, when we started this work, that black boys were more than twice than likely to have an exclusion than white children in Barnet schools, and as a local authority, Barnet had a higher rate of exclusions of black boys than other boroughs in north London. So we've had a tackling, disproportionality groups tackle that, and we've reduced that, so it's more - it feels more balanced now, although we're seeing different children now being subject to exclusion. So we're keeping an eye on those particular groups and suspensions, and that's part of the work that Chris is doing with schools as well, to have a look at those young people who are being suspended but not permanently excluded. We're also focused on our young people who are not in education, employment and training, and when we looked at our cohort, we could see of our need, the not education, employment and training cohort, 66% of them were male and 58% of them were from black and other minority ethnic groups, so we've got disparity and disproportionality in that group as well. So we can see it right through the youth justice system, similarly, transfers to probation, 80% of the boys, they were all boys that were transferred in the year to June 2024, 80% of them were from black and other minority backgrounds, and what we don't yet understand is at what point were they arrested and what charges they had and what was the kind of trigger for transferring to probation, so we need to just understand some of that detail a little bit clearer. Just to let you know that we have a long - there's a Pan-London Stop and Search pilot. It was launched in Haringey as a pilot about a year or so ago, and Haringey Council worked with the police and they dip sampled groups of children who were subject to stop and search to identify vulnerabilities in that particular group. We don't ordinarily - hadn't ordinarily received police notifications for children that were subject to stop and search, and what that audit found was that the children - some of these children were children that were in care, that had additional vulnerabilities, and the systems around those children were not being informed about these incidents, which meant that support couldn't be given to those children. So together with the police and Haringey, they've launched a campaign across London, so it's now a Pan-London pilot, and Barnett, alongside colleagues across London, are going to be doing dip sample audits on our own stop and search children and feed into that wider piece of work, and hopefully that will create a national change. I do have a question about that, but - and also the proportionality of it - and as long as - I know you're looking at it from - in terms of, you know, ethnic background, race, are you also looking at it in the context of disability? So I'm thinking about diverse - neurodiversity and mental health. The Haringey findings showed that there was a disproportionate number of children with SCN, EHCP, so there are vulnerabilities in this cohort of children, but we also know that the children that are in the youth justice system are similarly disproportionately - they're over-represented if they've got EHCP, so social communication difficulties in particular. So, yeah. So we'll let you know how that goes, so we're just starting that now, and that's being led by DI Dave Lariviere and Cezanne Tan from our youth justice team, so they're representing us in that piece of work. Tina, can I suggest maybe they come to a future board meeting to present on that at an appropriate time, I think would be good, because that would follow on from the report that you did last year. So do you want to - yeah, go ahead, Ray. Thanks, Chair. I just wanted to ask, Tina, because I know we've asked before about the numbers of autistic young people that you might be - the teams might be working with, and the issues they're facing. I mean, that's something we're keen on, both from the safeguarding adult boards' points of view and developing the autism strategy, and I was just wondering if somebody perhaps could come to the access to justice subgroup where we could go through that in more detail. I think it would be really helpful. We've got one in early December, and I suppose I'd be keen especially to be looking at the pathways we've got from either autistic people who are offending or autistic people who are victims of crime, and what pathways have we got to support another working world, because there's a lot of support out there. It's just making sure that those pathways are working effectively. So if we could get somebody down to the access to justice group in December, that would be great. Thanks. I think that our clinical - we've got a clinical psychologist in the team, and she's working largely with that, so I'll - yeah, please send me the dates, and I'll forward the invite to her. And if she can't come, I'm sure somebody else from the team will. So just on - so there's - so we also had a look at our restorative justice and victims programs, and that's been working really, really well, so we're working with young people to help them make reparations for their crimes and make contact with victims and write letters of apology and/or meet with victims to - so we're holding restorative conferencing. So we're having - interestingly, a number of victims don't want to engage in that process, but the young people are being encouraged to write those letters, even if the victims don't want to receive them, so that they are thinking about the consequences of their actions and the impact that their crimes have on the victims. So that's been a positive piece of work. We've got lots of young people involved in community reparation, and we've had five new sites set up in quarter one, so we've got Edgware, Library, Little Village, Second Chance, Chipping, and Osage Libraries are now sites for our young people to get involved, and we're giving young people AQA certificates, so that's recognized as part of their achievements as well, which has been really positive. We've given 112 of AQA certificates in quarter one, so lots of certificates being given out. Okay, so there's some stuff around, some online materials that have been published, and there's a link for you to have a look at that, and we'll report in quarter two on the Youth Justice residential, another successful residential in Surrey, I think we were this time, but that was really positive, and we've been working with an Olympian, BMXer, who's been delivering a program in the borough, him and his brothers and his father run a company now, teaching track racing skills, and it's focused on black young boys, that's been really positively received, so we hope we can continue that partnership if we have available funding. So the last part is on the integrated offender management, and the reducing offending delivery group, so the IOM, the stats are all reported within the report. We've been looking at the transition for young people, recognising, and we were talking about this in this Youth Justice Matters board that we just had yesterday, there's definitely a gap between young people coming out of the Youth Justice system, and then something happens in those intervening years before they end up in IOM, where they're now persistent, violent, prolific offenders, so we don't know what's happening in that space for those young people, because there's not many services connected to them post-18, so we're trying to understand how we can make that better for those young adults. So we can see that in quarter four, we didn't have the quarter one data for this year, but in quarter four, we saw violence moving to the top of the offences for IOM, which had taken over from theft in quarter three, but as expected, drugs, weapons, robbery, are all in those top five categories. Okay, so I think that's all from me on this one. Thank you. Any questions? Thank you very much. Are there any questions at all? Any further? No? Great, thank you. That's for noting, and then we move on to item 10, which is Update to Serious Violence Duty and Violence Reduction Plan, which Chris Kelly is going to take us through. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Again, I would refer our colleagues and yourself, Chair, to the report and also the violence reduction plan that's contained within the documents. I thought it would be helpful just to highlight some key achievements, really, and kind of key outputs that we've seen over the last quarter. So starting kind of on page five, under Governance, we continue to have a really strong partnership arrangements to join up, both strategically and also operationally as well. Very much it's evidenced through the various panels and also strategic groups in terms of TTCG, MACE, CS MARAC, and also problem-solving groups as well, which really seeks to establish a understanding of the presenting needs and themes that are emerging, and then also around kind of the actions in terms of mitigating risk around violence and also exploitation as well. We've a regularly distributing information in terms of our key partners as well in a proportionate way, support awareness, raising kind of the outward focus in terms of our partners understanding the local issues within communities and things as well, and also then being really kind of clear in terms of how they can raise further concerns that either, for example, their schools or various groups and young people that are raising know where to report back to. In terms of analysis and enforcement, we have a range of obviously police-led operations to address kind of localised needs. Again, a lot of that is identified through the partnership and governance arrangements that we have around kind of strategic meetings and also operational meetings as well. We've obviously heard from MPS colleagues around some of the successes that they've had over the last quarter around the reduction of violence against the persons, which has seen an 11 per cent decrease, and also in terms of a decrease of violence against persons with injury as well. We have seen during call suit one, which has already been discussed and highlighted, an increase around kind of knife crime offences, but that is not in relation to injury, and we feel that that is really just a potential impact of the increased operations and presence that we have within the communities at the moment. So we are very kind of keen in terms of targeting kind of areas that we are aware of that are linked in relation to kind of violence and things, and one of the things that we are doing in relation to that is obviously then triangulating and galvanising our outreach programmes and also our My Ends project when it comes online, and also the Safer Schools Robbery Safety Initiative as well. We will see kind of increased activity in quarter two around Project HADR as well, which again is predominantly a police-led but is also a partnership initiative as well, which will look at kind of a holistic way in which drugs are being tackled and also the associated crimes as well, so that would be something that would be reported back on in terms of next quarter. In terms of reducing access to weapons, we continue to work with our Barnet Education and Learning Service to track excluded and suspended young people, certainly where there has been some indications around either kind of weapons carrying or violence within the context of schools as well, and really kind of one of the things that leads to is targeting around their Restorative Justice hub and coordinating them will go into the schools and try to work with them in relation to pulling around kind of restorative conversations with young people, and also that it then leads to additional development around training, workforce development and stuff like that as well. What we've seen around our Restorative Justice over the last quarter is that they've gone into four schools with a total of 102 participants that have been involved in training, and at the moment what's happened is that that has then resulted in them actually taking on kind of more of a restorative conversations between people, between staff members and also young people as well, and then looking at kind of some forms of mediation and restorative meetings in relation to that as well. In terms of our outreach and detached, so looking at the activity which is occurring around that, during Quarter 1 we've had 67 sessions where we've had our outreach workers that have been targeting and being present within our communities. That's totaled 201 hours of delivery, and during that time we have reached 186 young people, and we're finding similar to the previous year really that the majority of engagement is with males, so that's around 56 per cent certainly during Quarter 1, and that the primary age group that we appear to be engaging with and that we're also receptive in relation to engagement is around that 12 to 15 age group as well, which we're quite positive around as it offers potential diversionary work, especially when you look at the strategic needs assessment and actually our higher range cohort in terms of violence and stuff tends to be plus 18 as well, so we're hoping that it will lead to diversionary work in relation to that. Some of the themes that emerged from the outreach work obviously get reflected back in terms of the governance arrangements and the range of meetings that we have, so examples of that is around of course CS MARAC and strategic MACE, and one of the positives that have come out from that as well is that we have found an unusual and unexpected theme of young people actually expressing an interest to becoming peer mentors and also becoming outreach workers themselves, which has been really, really good. So what we are really excited about is that that dovetails really beautifully into our Mayans projects, which will be coming online certainly in Quarter 2, which will then look at developing peer mentors and also kind of helping expand the outreach programme as well, so we will have some continuity around the delivery of that over the course of the next year. Is that the project with Alt Against Lives? It is indeed, yeah. I think coming from a background in the youth sector that that is really, really welcome in terms of young people being able to step forward and encourage others is fantastic, thanks. I just wanted to check it was that project, thank you. So the other part, just to link to that as well, is that our after-school safety initiative project which is looking at tackling kind of localised robberies, certainly within our transport hubs, we have started to mobilise and come online in relation to that during Quarter 1 through our partnership with NPS. So that has been through the marking of mobile phones, we've begun to get in contact and to be present within our schools as well and also to raise awareness around that and we've just appointed the two workers that will then be mobilised to actually be providing the community safety aspect and then also around the outreach aspect within our transport hubs and it's expected they will start in Quarter 2. So working with our communities, we continue to deliver around our contextual training, so that is both to our VCS partners, grassroots organisations as well as partners as well and that we also continue to have a substantial and comprehensive wraparound in terms of when serious incidents do occur. So what we are able to do is look at attending and facilitating a range of community impact meetings where there have been incidents of violence and to then be looking at coordinating the input through our violent integrative clinical service and then also any other support charities and businesses that can potentially help support around the collective and individual kind of trauma and emotional impacts around that. In terms of building on the victim's care hub, Quarter 1 had seen a total of 54 referrals which is sort of forecast to be well over what we had intended to deliver and clearly there is a significant demand in relation to the victim's care hub. We are seeing that the type of referrals are really kind of coming from a range of different partners but children and young people services of course, community safety, police and we are really focussed at the moment on promoting greater awareness around the victim's care hub in terms of our housing colleagues as well and that's because there has been a range of coordinating meetings over Quarter 1 which has kind of indicated vulnerability of housing tenants which has then resulted in coordinated activity and we want to make sure that there is a comprehensive support there for the victim as well. Just I made a referral myself last week and that was something I was fortunate to go on a ride along with the police response team and so I think it would be helpful to join up there actually for some of those cases to increase awareness of the support hub because it proved very useful and it was very useful to be able to offer that support. Thank you Councillor, I'll make sure that it's prioritised. Thank you and also thanks to the team both on Restorative Justice and the victim support hub who responded incredibly quickly to that, thank you. In terms of the nature of the referrals, we find that the majority of referrals are around crime prevention in terms of general things and then the next area which we are seeing quite significant demand on is in relation to victims of common assault and also life crime as well and then around exploitation, so specifically around criminal exploitation. We see that in terms of the breakdown around those 54 referrals, 34 of those were adults, 24 of those were children and again we're seeing more males that are engaging in the context of that service as well, so 32 males which we were working with in terms of victims. I'll hold there for any questions from colleagues. Please go ahead, thank you. I guess just an observation for me, I know the duty kind of goes up to 25 in terms of interventions, I noticed that a lot of the kind of outreach work, diversionary work kind of stops at 18 and just in the kind of language it's around kind of young people, actually I'm kind of wondering what focus we have as an authority around young adults and those 18 to 25s and particularly around, we talked a lot about the kind of educational piece, how far are we into FE colleges and to some degree some universities where people are coming in with that kind of serious violence piece post 18. So in terms of restorative justice, we have begun to work with Middlesex University and that we do have existing links in terms of Barnet and Southgate as well. What I was going to say, with the outreach side of things it's really interesting because the project is actually scoped to be working with also engaging with young adults up to the age of 25 as well and we continue to try and engage with our plus 18 cohorts when out and about and there is a reluctance in relation to that, however the workers are continuing and they are absolutely aware that they need to continue to try and engage in terms of that age group. So I guess how do we, from a probation service we're dealing with those adults, how do we engage in that process and ensure that our young people know that these services exist locally? Sorry, could you repeat that just a second? That's okay, so from a probation perspective where we're often working with these young people as both perpetrators and victims, how do we ensure that we can promote the accessibility to those services locally? So I think that it's around making sure that there's an awareness within probation in terms of what services and local services are around. What we can do is that there is kind of a community directory which has been pulled around as part of the needs assessment for the serious violence duty as well which outlines a range of kind of youth provisions that were focused around supporting young people, around awareness of weapons and violence and things as well, that can absolutely be shared and I can ping the cross over to your workers and things as well. The other thing as well with that is that we also try to ensure that kind of the adult's risk panel is coordinating some of that activity for also those young adults and things that we're worried about in terms of violence as well. And my final question, Chris, sorry, will you please note, will the kind of intervention such as that kind of peer mentoring that you've talked about be available to that 80s/25 cohort as well? So we, sorry, we are really kind of focused in terms of looking at trying to expand on universal offers around mentoring for that older age group. At the moment there is a bit of a gap as kind of highlighted by Tina around the IOM cohort as well, post-18 to them becoming a little bit older and that's something that we're really focused on in terms of looking at what potential opportunities there are in terms of funding and projects and around also how we can effectively engage and help continue to promote different trajectories for that group as well. Thank you and it does sound like an area for future work for co-production with young people as well and there might, I can see Tina's got her hand up and there might be more we want to pick up in the private bit of the meeting as well. Thank you. I'm just thinking, Karine, when we get information about London Crime Prevention Fund because the ex-offender mentoring service that we have that's attached to the IOM that's funded through the London Crime Prevention Fund and we haven't yet, correct me if I'm wrong Matt, we haven't yet had any requests, we haven't been given the amount that we've got available to us for the next three years yet and all of that funding is part of that funding suite that runs out in March 25, the when and if we get an invitation to set out what we'd like to deliver over the next three years, we could certainly, I think because we know that we've got this gap that we could extend that programme to younger probation cohorts, so young adult cohort that's open to probation, not just specifically IOM. Not just IOM, because IOM's only 25% of the young people on IOM and they are a specific group of individuals that actually get a lot of support in other areas anyway but I'm thinking more broadly about the generic caseload as you've highlighted and we do have loads of young adults on our caseload that are not IOM. I think it's something we definitely need to look closer into together and with certain local partners as well. I think Matt wants to say something, thanks. Yeah, chair, unfortunately we received apologies from Alice Bird from MOPAC for this meeting, the two items that I was hoping Alice could give us an update on, I chased it in the background by email, is number one, Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London, is currently out to local authorities consulting on the police and crime plan that has to be published by the 31st of March of next year, 2025. In previous funding streams for the local crime prevention fund, which is the sole money that is being referred to in this matter, we were given quite short notice for submission of bids, which Chris and I completed, so what I've asked is, number one, could we try, if possible please, and have some kind of earlier prior notice so we can bring it to elected members and colleagues to determine what we would like to propose to use that funding for, and two, could you try and indicate as best as you can, allowing for the current circumstances nationally, what that grant funding offer is likely to be, and what you would wish for London and specifically Barnet local authorities to seek to invest in, and what would be your running times for that. The problem that we have with grant funding, especially from grant funding streams such as MOPAC is, it's often decided in quite short notice for those agencies or those services to then make that grant submission, so we can plan but we can't predict, and that is a vulnerability for us from the work streams that we're doing already. Having said that, we've put that representation in, I've asked Alice via email yesterday, okay you can't come, could you please try and give us some kind of indication, and I'll carry that on as a piece in the background and obviously brief Claire and Dec according. Thank you very much, I'd also like to note just how well the relationship between the different departments in the council is working, particularly the two of you, and the bids that have come through this year, I'm aware that it's a healthy challenge that we all give ourselves in the way things are constructed in Barnet, and I think it's very welcome. I also have squibbled a note myself on the MOPAC issue, I'm very happy to take that up, we're very happy to take that up as an administration and if there's any appropriate meetings, letters etc we can have a chat afterwards about that, thank you. Thank you very much, that was really detailed and obviously a very important area of work for everybody, and thank you for the questions as well, so we note that and we move on to 2011, which is the hate crime update, thank you. Thank you very much, I hope you've always had an opportunity to read the report, I'm sure you're very aware of what's been happening nationally with the riots, all of which mostly was driven by fake news, misinformation, we've seen a rise of over 200% in anti-Semitism in Barnet alone since the October conflict that began last year, and one third of all anti-Semitism across London happens in Barnet as well, so we've got together things, there's a focus, we need to be focusing on community cohesion, one of those areas I think is tackling hate crime, so together with Councillor Conway, the comms team, myself, lots of different areas across the local authority, we've been looking at how can we in some way drive or tackle hate crime, this report really just brings together what we're doing currently and this is just the start, there's lots of things happening in the future, we've got the Hate Crime Awareness Week coming up in October, there is a comms campaign will be starting right on the back of that, we also have a hate crime summit that is also planned for early October, and really I just want to highlight some of the areas in here, some of the things we're doing at the moment across the local authority, the community safety team, one of the priorities is access to justice for people who are victims of hate crime really just to ensure that people feel comfortable and confident in reporting their hate crimes, myself, the hate crime lead obviously, and I do a lot of work with schools, early intervention, classroom settings, bullying, discrimination, resilience about hatred, online we have lots of funding coming from the SCF now, lots of the shared endeavour funding, which has seen a lot of organisations and I hope at the next meeting I have some outcomes of those deliveries, many of that, much of that, in fact not all of it, is happening within schools, looking at anti-discrimination, hate crime, online resilience, critical thinking, that kind of thing, the task and finish group I think I've just mentioned, and we will have a bit more information on that comms update I believe a bit later on, we've got someone from comms is going to give a bit more detail about that summit and the campaign. We have the Hate Crime Awareness Campaign at the beginning, the Community Capacity Project that has just finished, I'm hoping to have some outcomes from that as well, obviously we have Ray representing, Mencap here as well, with the Zero Tolerance to Hate Crime Projects and I think you might be given a quick update when I finish this, is that okay, I know we've got a great opportunity there now, Fayez is doing absolute wonders at Mencap there. We have the Family Services as well, the Resources Toolkit that Tina shared with us at an earlier meeting that I've been sharing with schools and other professionals, etc, etc, with our partners the police as well, there's a lot of the focus I think on some of those events that are tied to the Palestine and Israel conflicts as well, Michael Buckley as well, we've been very much engaged with local authority, with Ray, with Fayez, with the comms team really so we can just work together to drive and tackle this head on, there's a Why Me campaign video, there's a new video for immigrants or unaccompanied young people, it's just been launched as well, 22 local authorities have come together to put that together, one of those videos focuses on, in over 100 languages, focuses on the justice system as well, so we're hoping that people have the confidence to come forward, report more so we can understand a lot more. Safe and Safety Scheme as well, again another thing that has been driven by the community, the zero project, zero tolerance to hate crime projects, and really just going forward, this is not where it stops, this is where it starts, anyone who has any thoughts or comments or suggestions of how we can improve reporting more than anything else, we know that hate crime isn't one of the massively unreported crimes, any way we can ease that, we're looking at maybe expanding the reporting centres, a couple of mosques I think are interested in opening or at least developing some hate crime reporting there, I do believe I think Islamophobia with Barney is very much underreported as well, so anyone, we're always open to suggestions, ideas, input, engagement, anything that can help us improve. Yes. It's not an idea that came from me, but we ran a focus group with our sleepers a couple of weeks ago and they commented that in response to the Southport incident that led to a large rise across everyone, including in Barnet, in potential risks, everything closed and they were left really very vulnerable with nowhere to go, and asked that in the future if you're doing emergency planning that actually those who are sleeping in our borough feature into that because they felt very vulnerable, left without any access to services, so I said I'd raise it here. Okay so what group was that in particular? That's individuals who are sleeping rough in the borough. Okay, homeless, yes, very good point, very good point as well, and I think to be aware as well we do have five hotels in Barnet that are housing asylum seekers and much of the rights happening around the country, I mean I say isolated, there were isolated incidents last year on a much smaller scale where people turned up in the hundreds angry and because of fake news, they're living five-star lifestyles while we are freezing or living on the streets, so yes certainly homeless people, thank you. Fiona, I think if you could put that in writing as well that would be really helpful because what we're trying to do collectively is to start a conversation with all communities on this so that the summit that's been proposed by officers that we're bringing together covers a range of different people coming to that first meeting, there will also be an opportunity for a discussion online and the whole idea is that we start this conversation this October to co-produce with our communities where we go on this together, what has come very strongly as well because my portfolio covers, and we deliberately constructed it like this, community safety and resident participation, so there's been a whole programme of round tables that we've been doing anyway through the year as well as the leader listens etc, and so there's a very keen sense from local communities, not that we just don't just look at hate crime, but that we look at community cohesion and we actually celebrate, highlight, extend the initiatives that run anyway across our borough, and I think I will always be this balancing voice but I think the response in Finchley from meeting with the local communities, from the fact that it was possible for the multi-faith forum to go in collectively and address Friday prayers, all of the informal outreach that's happened, the support for asylum seekers locally etc, we're not complacent but it has been extraordinary and very encouraging alongside the very difficult figures and time that it has been for communities in this borough. I will do that, I will set out, because actually the people we spoke with were very complimentary about other aspects of support as well that they do see and can access, it was just that specific gap and they understood, they understood why libraries closed, why everyone closed because of safety issues, it's just they wanted to ensure that in future, so no I'll do a summary of that whole discussion actually and put it onto you so you can include that in future. That would be really helpful because there's obviously homeless action in various people and places came to mind as somewhere that we could do separate listening and discussions with. I'm also conscious that the police after that whole operation sent us all as partners, what do you think was missing, what could we do differently, I think we all operate a learning by doing approach as well and are always interested in knowing what is and isn't lacking, which is part of this as well is to look at how we kind of review things, keep things different and work with communities going forward, so thank you. I wanted to give a specific update really on the zero tolerance to hate crime part of things because we have had a problem over the last year in that we did have a vacant pulse for about six months, so that did impact on the project. What we've done now is we've filled it, we've filled it temporarily and now we've just filled it permanently and someone is about to start. Where I'd say it's caused particular problems is that it meant we haven't had the programme of training and workshops and there's been less support for the hate crime reporting census and that certainly I'd say impacted on the number of reports, so that's one of the things that we need to catch up on now, we've got people back in post and I'd say the census especially we use in the hate crime week as a way to kind of reinvigorate them. I think there's things they can do during the week that would promote themselves both to their own staff and to other users as well, so it has been a difficult period and we do appreciate itself as being a time when hate crime has been very much to the fore, but we're ready to catch up now. Thank you. That's very welcome to hear because part of it is to refresh what was there before in terms of the hate champions network and newsletter and all of that kind of thing. I think a lot of people stand ready to help and to be part of something very positive locally so that's great. I think I now need to read out, I don't need to read out the whole thing, that's a great relief to everybody, so we're just noting the recommendations and thanking everybody. That takes us on to item 12 which is the combatting drugs partnership update. I would note that in this area we try to work very closely together, we also operate learning by doing. I think the addition of Project Adda to the borough this year is making a really welcome contribution as well. Are we starting with Councillor Moore? I don't mind, but thank you both for being here and Louisa as well, who I think is online and we wish you well. Thanks. Thank you, Chair. I would just introduce Louisa who will present the report and to highlight it is an annual report, an update, but also presenting the new structure of the combatting drugs partnership board for your information and noting how we'll continue working. And I'll hand over to Louisa, I hope she's feeling better today. Thank you very much Louisa and for joining us despite not being well which is really appreciated. I think the new structure is very welcome because I know when we've been at meetings it has often felt like there isn't enough time to discuss in depth certain things. I think one thing I would add is Operation Woodson which has been underway this year in Bundtok and the very close working relationship and cooperation between the police, community safety, youth outreach and Change Grow Live with very clear offer of support as well as enforcement going on there which I think is really appreciated by everyone and actually has had several conversations with communities locally about that as well so I think it's a wider education piece that happens. I think Councillor Moore would like to add something as well, thank you. I just wanted to thank, firstly to start by thanking all the officers both within the council and actually across partners because while we haven't had absolutely consistent presence at our board meetings, actually we really have done quite well compared with some of our partners, some of our other borough authorities in terms of getting partners around the table and it spans right the way across council departments such as Public Health and Children's Family Services. Housing very importantly have been engaging but the reality is that they're formal meetings and the real meat of the work goes on through those relationships that are built outside those formal meetings so I absolutely do support the reduction of the formal meetings to two a year. I was very clear though that they needed to be aligned with the schedules of dates for Health and Wellbeing board and Safe Community Partnership board because this is the public and transparent reporting of that work that we are able to report in public and it's also really important that timing gives input to strategic decision making by those two boards as well so I support it but I want to make sure that that's aligned and also enjoy partners to really pick up the baton in terms of leading on that work. You've talked around the table today about some really good working across departments within and beyond the council, across police, with probation and a range of others and so I think it's another case where it's very much more than the sum of the parts and so it's about making use of the resources, sometimes scarce that we have, making sure it's targeted into the right place to make the very best, get the very best for our local residents, particularly those who are struggling and getting to get their lives back on track. Thanks very much. Thank you. I should note also I bumped into Change Grow Live yesterday as well while I was out and about and spoke to them about working with us possibly as volunteers with a listening session around the development of the VORG and DA strategy that actually came from them and a chat and an offer so I was going to bring that up too. I think Claire's got something you'd like to add. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thanks, it's really good to see an update on how the partnership is working and all of the results. I know various colleagues around the table are involved in. With regards to the new structure, I think it looks like a really good structure going forward. I'd just like to add that we probably need to add in the overview and scrutiny on the top level of that chart because we have crime and disorder overview and scrutiny annually in the summer and last year Louisa did attend with an update from the Combatting Drugs Partnership so in terms of absolute oversight it would kind of feed into that, that sits across health and wellbeing board and to the Community Safety Partnership. It's a challenge, I think that's obviously very sensible. Thank you very much. I know we all sit in a lot of meetings but there is a really strong collaborative approach here across partners and all officers and it's really very welcome. If I might, I should have said it when I was thanking officers, actually just a recognition that some of the work has been presented at Pan London and wider bodies as well so there is broader recognition of some of the work that's going on, particularly with young people. Great, thank you. So we note that as in the report and then we move on to our final item which is safety in parts. I would like to note two things here just before I hand over to Cassie. One is that this actually came from a comment originally from Overview and Scrutiny Committee who were wanting to see some, I think they were looking at they were going to do some stuff on parts but actually it worked with work we wanted to do so that link is really important and the dialogue with all councillors and I'd also like to thank my colleague Councillor Schneiderman for his work and his input on this because a cabinet system enables us to work very collaboratively as a team as well so that's really appreciated too. Thank you Cassie. Thank you Cassie. I think also to pick up on what you said about the volunteering groups and the incredible way in which residents sort of are active in our green spaces. I think often when I'm asked what do you mean by resident participation it's very much how residents choose to engage and I think some of the way people feel safer certainly from having been on sort of some of the Friends' litter picks and all of that sort of stuff in Burntoke and Wider is because they're going together and there's a sense of community that, you know, something that starts as a litter pick transforms into something completely different with the connections locally which is really wonderful to see and I think there's been such a growth in that in the past few years in the borough. I've not been to the green spaces forum actually for a while so if it's helpful to sort of go to that. That was a meeting I used to go to quite a bit so if you'd like me to go okay in this sort of role that would be great. I don't know if anyone's got any questions or comments. Lots here, go ahead. Thanks chair, thanks Cassie. It's been a really detailed piece of work so thanks very much for coordinating it and everybody that's been involved. The one thing I just wasn't sure which I just wanted to check for clarity really which isn't included in the report necessarily or the recommendations but we have spoken about it previously was around where we've got venues in parks such as cafes etc etc just looking at what the leases or contracts that we have so if for example they you know the operating hours whether there's anti-social behaviour or any safety concerns linked with a venue what kind of conditions we have and I know that you said that would be a wider review I just didn't want to lose it in this piece of work. Thank you. I think that would be great because also once I understand what you're saying and I've had conversations myself with the estates team at points it's also very much about protecting the people that are taking those leases on as well so it's not just a prohibitive thing it's there to try and keep everybody safer and I think in certain situations would be very welcome. Declan. Thank you chair. Just very quickly to mention that one of the big issues that we had and we were trying to work through was the public's perception of safety in the parks because it doesn't necessarily mean that parks are unsafe it's just that they feel unsafe or look unsafe and that's what the feel is and as you know we're we're working on patrols etc which will help with that high visibility presence we've got a couple of high visibility vans coming on board within the next couple of weeks yes that's right and that's that's that's coming away that will obviously feed into the results of what's going on and we'll keep tabs and keep Cassie involved with that and how we're doing that and just to add that our police colleagues are also involved with the parks because they use our PSPO tickets as well so they're out there and this is all hopefully going to add to the perception of the parks being a much safer place I think I'll just add as well that the reason we brought in a PSPO across the borough and the provisions there was very much from listening to residents on doorsteps across the borough and in the parks too so it's you know it's it's something that was developed very much with an item to all of that I'm sure we'll be hearing more about the vehicles that are coming soon to our parks I know that's been a very long-term project by the council as well thank you very much Cassie to you Matt and all the team for your work on this thank you so we note that report the forward work program I don't know if anybody's got anything oh sorry Fiona just the safeguarding adults board annual review will need to be probably at the next meeting if that's still possible just because then I'll be able to present it that's November the 29th yep could you send us an email just so can we pick that up yeah thank you that's great does anyone have any other business of course wow I'll just switch the mic two very quickly things of this too but I will be really brief what both good news I think first one and initially when I started back in 2017 the police raised concerns that there wasn't a tiny appropriate adult service for adults obviously children is that the children families pay for and for young people who are brought into custody but there's no legal requirement for anybody to do that for adults Mopac have finally agreed to fund it and it will start in January 2025 Ray and I are meeting with the lead to look at KPIs and what could be reported to locally around the impact and how that's working so hopefully that'd be really welcome news to your custody officers it's definitely welcome news for our client base because they're brought into custody they should get more timely support the other bit of news I thought I'm sorry I'm stealing your thunder cream but I think it's I've heard some very good things about the SDS 40 release earlier this month I have and I thought it might be oh so the pretty release that happened earlier and I thought so I just wondered if we could have I know that the London they're looking at are there lessons to be learned and to because obviously there's another release in October but generally I wondered if we could have the highlights to the next meeting or something thank you very much so that both welcome bits of good news of course we will be talking in the private bit of the meeting about how that first place has gone and lessons done because it's something with keeping a very close eye on so I think that would need to be a discussion as to what it's possible to bring to the next meeting what it is and and other routes for sharing that but thank you for raising that that's great so the next meeting is on the 29th of September so November we're in September sorry it's certainly very busy and we'll see everybody then and thank you all very much for the contributions and thank you to everyone online thank you (silence)

Transcript

Hello, good morning, welcome. I'm Councillor Sara Conway, Chair of the Safer Communities Partnership Board. Thank you for attending our meeting this morning, both in the room and online. Please note that meetings may be recorded and broadcast by people present as allowed for in-law or by the Council. Can I please remind the board to use the microphone when speaking by pressing the middle speaker icon. Press once to turn it on and once to turn it off. We ask that you remain seated throughout the meeting unless you are called to the table to address the board. I don't think we need everyone to introduce themselves. I do know that my colleague, Councillor Moore, is here, who chairs the Combat and Drugs Partnership Board, and that is so that we can join up the work that the Council is doing on key statutory requirements and generally on community safety. Apologies for absence, I think it's Greg from Barnet Homes, and I think Corinne is going to join us a bit later. Minutes of the previous meeting, does everyone agree with the minutes? Yep, nodding on line two, thank you, so they're agreed. Do any members have any interest to disclose today? Nope, that's great. Public questions and comments, we don't have any. Matters arising, does anybody have anything they need to raise at this point? Nope. So we'll start with the performance update, quarter one, which I think is Declan and Matt and the police as well. I'd like to start, as I often do, by thanking everybody from all the teams for all the work they've been doing in the past quarter. I know it has been difficult, challenging, et cetera, but everybody has done their very best through some particularly difficult situations in the summer, which I also notice the remarkable way our communities have responded to coming together to the, not threat, the difficulties Barnet found itself in. Thank you. Good morning, Councillor, good morning, attendees. The performance dashboard is on the screen behind you, Lieutenant and Councillor Moore. I possibly invite you to rotate your chairs so you don't get a crip neck or you can follow it on your laptops. Just a reminder, next slide, please, Ben. Just a reminder of where the data is sourced from. All of the crime data is taken from the London data website for our monthly crime data dashboard collation and the slides that relate to Barnet Council's assurance group community safety team functions is taken from the community safety team's internal data sources. Next slide, please, Ben. The ranking is self-explanatory. However, for people who haven't visited this meeting before, the ranking structure above is indicative of where we are placed by comparison to our either London colleagues for other boroughs or in relation to our tribe borough colleagues, and our tribe borough being Brent and Harrow. Ben, next slide, please. The next set of slides are actually police performance data. Therefore, chair, with your permission, I'll hand off to my police colleague. Good morning, everyone. I hope you can hear me okay. So I'm going to go over the Berkeley figures in the last three months from April to June, 400 cases of residential Berkeley in Barnet. The previous three months we showed a downward trend of 16 out of the 32 boroughs, but we now have an emerging issue. We're up 22 out of the 32 boroughs. In comparison with the three months last year, we were one out of the three boroughs across the north-west, and that is obviously rising. So from that, there is an increase from 371 burglaries that's gone up to 400, which is up 7.8%. However, the year-to-date figures, the burglary has gone down for the year-to-date figures for that. I'll move on to burglary business and community. Three months from April to June, there were 120 cases of non-residential burglary. We were sitting 13th out of the 32 B.C.U.s. We are now 6th out of the 32, so we have an improving figure for that, and it's a downward trend we're showing. The comparison from the three months previously was that we were in the middle of the three boroughs on north-west, and we're still there, and that hasn't changed. For the non-residential burglaries, we were sitting at 159, and now we're down to 120. That's down 24.5%, but there's no year-to-date figures. It hasn't shown any increase or decrease. We're just static for that. I'll move on to robbery next. Our robbery figures are showing 161 cases of robbery of personal property in Barnet. That was previously nine out of the 32 B.C.U.s, and now we're showing 11. It's an emerging issue for the robbery, and against our other boroughs in north-west, again, we are sitting middle of the road for that. For robbery, it was 166. Previously, we are now 161, so it's down 3%, but overall, the year-to-date figures, we are up slightly with a 5.5% increase in robbery. If we go to violence with injury, three months today, it was 475 cases of violence with injury in Barnet. We were three out of the 32 boroughs, now down to the second-best within the Met, and we're also the best within the actual B.C.U. itself. For violence with injury, we were 572 previously. We are now shown as 475. That is down 17%, and also our year-to-date figures is down 6.8% for our violence with injury. The knife crime with injury, there's 19 cases of knife crime recorded in Barnet. We were six out of the 32 boroughs, now down to the fifth, best in the Met for improving figures, and we are also the best within the B.C.U. itself. For knife crime with injury, it was sitting at 22, and we are down to 19 cases. That's down 13.6%. However, we have got year-to-date figures. We're still up 18.6, but we are looking for that downward trend, which is really positive. Then moving on to our lethal-barrel discharges. There was one case of lethal-barrel discharge in Barnet. Previously, that was 21 of the 32 boroughs. We are now improving on that. We are down to the 12th best within the Met, and we are again the second within the B.C.U. itself. For lethal-barrel discharges, there were three cases previously in the period, and we are now down to one, so that's a 66.7% decrease. The year-to-date figures were also down 84.6% for lethal-barrel discharges. For domestic abuse, there were 146 cases of domestic abuse in Barnet. Of the three months, we were the third out of the Met, and we've actually improved on that number. We're down to the second best in the Met, and also the best within the B.C.U. itself. Previously, there were 178 cases. We are now down to 146 of domestic abuse cases. That's down 18%, and our year-to-date figures are also down 46%. I think I will hand it over to Declan now. Is that right, or Matt? It's my turn again. Thank you very much, Chair. If you are happy, I will proceed now with the anti-social behaviour data for the Borough. As you can see, colleagues, from the slides, the top left is the use of our tools and powers. The top right is fixed penalty notices, where we're tackling anti-social behaviour in the form of environmental crime, and in the bottom right is the community's trigger data. If I could just touch on a few headlines, it's quite obvious there are some uses of tools and powers that have not been used. That's not uncommon. It does depend upon where cases are and who is the lead agency for that case. However, in the current data, what is obvious is the use of the Public Spaces Protection Order has jumped in May, and middle point in June of May's figure, thereabouts. But the reason for that jump is the Community Safety Team annually do a co-operative piece with our Parks colleagues, and we carry out intensive enforcement with the Neighbour Police and Team and the Community Safety Team. We do it through the week, Councillor, but we also have an enhanced focus at the weekends and on Friday evenings. A lot of those offences, without going too granular for you, are linked to set open spaces where people misuse barbecues or park in such a way that they cause obstructions for other people to be able to use those facilities. The premises closure of the data, the three in June are linked to the three blocks that were closed in the Graham Park Estate as part of the ongoing work on Operation Dakota. I will touch on Operation Dakota workload in the CSMAIC slide after this one because there is a relevancy following the last couple of weeks' outcomes. The fixed penalty notice data is self-explanatory. It's the number that have been issued, the number that have been paid, those that haven't been paid. I've sat in my inbox, awaiting to be referred to HB-LUB for prosecution. And then the community trigger application, again, just because the community trigger, which is now on our website, has been changed because the Home Office changed the title of the way it's been case reviewed, but for the benefit of this meeting and wider knowledge we've left it in as a community trigger. It was only one for that period, which is good, but by the same token of reassurance to you, just because it might not meet the threshold for community trigger does not mean that case does not get the same scrutiny and level of review as a community trigger because we do want to make sure that we don't fail the victim or reporting party in any way. Next slide, please, Ben. You will obviously see two community safety matter meetings dated at CASF because it's a six-weekly rotation and the July meeting was on the middle of July. I think it was the 9th of July for memory. The reason why I'd like to have a quick highlight on the number of cases coming in and them lowering is because we have been waiting for the Operation Dakota court outcomes cases to come to fruition. That date has been provided now, so whilst it may be low in this period and I'm expecting to see it at the next meeting to have risen, not considerably but have risen, and basically we have shut down quite a few cases that have naturally come to their conclusion and end point and they have been provided in some of the case studies for the end-of-year report and there will be some of the case studies that go in your mid-year report for the community safety team for tackling anti-social behaviour. Do you have any questions on those two slides, CASF? In that case, then I'll hand over to Declan for the CCTV. Thank you, Matt. Chair, these next couple of slides are just a brief overview of the CCTV because it is just a three-month picture of what we're seeing and it's really to give you some confidence around how the CCTV is working rather than delving into the granular figures that they're seeing because they're not particularly indicative of what's happening across the borough. So the first slide is, as you can see there, what we've done is we've split the reactive and proactive use of CCTV. So 87% of what the CCTV guys are doing in the control room is actually identifying stuff outside, which we didn't have that capability before we are now. Only 13% of it is reactive and that is stuff that they may be hearing on the police radios and are then focusing in or they're being asked to focus in on a particular location because something is taking place. So you can see there's a massive difference between that. It just shows how good the facility is there for identifying information. When you look at the actual figures, there was just under 1,900 incidents recorded by CCTV just in that three-month period. So an extremely useful tool and having had conversations with police colleagues, I think they're finding it extremely useful as well. Overall, it was 101 CCTV requests from insurance companies during that three months. So again, things like your road traffic accidents, et cetera, are being captured and there is footage so that can be dealt with. The next slide, thanks Ben. The next slide really, what we've done this time round is we've split all 24 wards down into the top 12 and the bottom 12 of incidents. Now, it's a little bit of a different picture because not every ward has got the same number of cameras. So you will obviously have recorded more in those wards that have got much more cameras. But if we go through some of the statistics, you'll see, so Collindale North, for instance, the figures, 231 for ASB, Beggin 24, Rough Sleepers 22 and others. So I've got others down there and this is just the individuals. When you look at the number there, 53, that is over a 12 week period. So they are just individual incidents. It could be a fraud incident that they've heard about on the radio and we'll focus in to see what they can see. It might be an accident. It could be a road traffic collision, something like that. And there's just very few of them. So if we were to put them all on this report, you'd have like 30 pages. So I've just put it down under other. With the rest of the boards, you know, you can see how it filters down and you can see what the primary offences are that are being spotted. So I know we've spoken previously about Beggin and you can see how that's filtering out across the borough and how we're actually capturing evidence of that on the on the footage. And of course, that gives us the ability to either speak to police or deal with the matter ourselves via the community safety team. And the other elements of it, fly tipping is very important because that's a key priority for the community safety team. And when they're captured, you know, again, the information is you'll have a vehicle and a registration number and description of a person. And that's then passed on to the team to investigate. And that will inevitably result in an enforcement activity of sample or prosecution. So we're getting much better at that. And the evidence is now helping us with all of that. So the next slide, I think it's just the second half of the ward, so the lower reports. Again, it's showing you the top elements of each ward. But as I said, in some of these wards, there is fewer cameras than in others. So you will get lower reports coming through. I mean, unless there's unless you've got any questions on that particular aspect of it, this is just an overview of how that's working. Thank you very much. I think I'd just add a couple of things. We've obviously started a fly tipping campaign as the council, sorry, working with the place team and enforcement together. And there's been the posters on bus stops and that sort of thing. So that's welcome. And, you know, it's a key issue for residents in particular wards, including my own. I think we'll also be doing a campaign around the PSPO, which will be very welcome as well to highlight awareness. I just wanted to note going backwards on the gun crime and the really significant decline in that we were on grand part yesterday, a team of us of police and council and talking to residents again, I don't think we can ever underestimate the difference that that operation has made. It's not perfect. There's always ongoing need, but the difference that has made for this borough in terms of where we were a year or so ago is quite extraordinary. And I also wanted to note on the robbery figures that have gone up that we'll be doing, I think it's both teams, family services and community safety, a specific violence reduction unit supported project starting very soon. So I don't know if anyone wants to mention that at all at this point. And yes, we'll keep an eye on the merit cases and just understand what's what's coming through that. I think Fiona, did you want to? No, not at all. And nice to see you, Declan. I just noticed that there's a number of instances that just has rough sleeping. Obviously that's not a crime and generally those individuals are incredibly vulnerable. So I wondered what does that prompt? Do your team then contact Streetlink? Do they contact outreach workers so that they can get access to support in a timely fashion? Yeah, thanks, Fiona. So the purpose of it on the CCTV slides is really that the CCTV operators are identifying where there is rough sleeping taking place that is then passed on. So we will always get a report every day. We get a report in community safety of basically these figures. And that will get passed on to our teams. They'll go out and they'll see who these people are. And we'll engage with the rough sleeping team as well. So they go out and then they can help these individuals. Does it also pick up people who are living in vehicles? It's a bit difficult for that because are they actually living it? Are they just waiting for somebody? I think when it gets reported to us as somebody living in vehicles, then the same process takes place. But whether it's picked up on a CCTV camera, it's a slightly different thing. Also, just to add that certainly from putting the CCTV in from the early figures and things, I was really encouraged by the number of welfare check calls that were also made with ambulances, et cetera, called for people in distress, which wasn't necessarily our priority when we put it in. It was very much on the policing and crime side. But that has always been a very welcome additional feature with this. I think if you're ready to move on, Chair, the next slide is pairing with prevent. Thank you. I think, as you can see, the most glaring figure six out there is a 53% increase, almost 53% increase, on the same period last year for Q1. The main reason for that is that Q1 of 22/23 was exceptionally low. We normally get around 30 referrals in a period, and it just happened that last year was quite low. Some of those that came in, what you might see, there's a 125% increase on mixed, unclear and unspecified. Those areas will be changed going forward. I think SO15 and the Home Office are trying to understand those referrals a bit more, so they're breaking down rather than the broader, other or mixed, unclear. They'll be breaking down to lots of different areas, so maybe next time I'll be reporting something a bit different. But some of the things, for example, that we did see rising this year came from those low-level antisemitism that very much were associated with the current conflict that's going on in the area at the moment, some odd ones with a young person bringing in an imitation firearm, someone calling for medieval law to be brought back. Also, we had someone referring to Elliott Rogers, who was an infamous multiple-killer, a multiple-school shooting. There's a lot of areas there, but if we look at the next page, the next slide, rather, which compares to national figures, what we see there are very, very similar to what the rest of the country are reporting. As always, we always report higher levels of young people being referred, because we are in a borough, in an area that we're fortunate enough to have a Preventive Education Officer up until April of this year, and I think schools are just a lot more aware. Just going forward, though, we have seen a tour – we've had a couple of referrals – that have been associated with the national riots, and these were quite other ways, really, that the people who have been identified just happened to be seen in the media by people who knew them, and they featured in papers, so quite public incidents, but they, going forward, you may see that rise as we understand all those referrals come forward. Thank you. Any questions? I would just like to note at this point that the Council, which you've been very involved with and the different teams, has been doing a review of our work on hate crime and community cohesion very much. We were going to be doing that anyway, because the strategy concludes this year, but to co-produce and have a dialogue with all of our communities, and there will be work coming up in Hate Crime Week and beyond to start a conversation and to very much highlight the strengths of this borough, as well as understanding the issues that are out there, so thank you. I can't see any questions online, either, and I'm also aware that some people online are in the room, too, which is a bit confusing as well. Hello, Chris. So I think that's it on these slides, then, and we'll move on to – sorry, Claire's about to tell me we need to note them, so we've noted the slides and thank everyone for their contribution and their work. That takes us on to, I think, the more detailed update, verbally, from the North West BCU police, if that's okay. Sorry, I think it's – yeah, it's okay, and I'm a bit confused with the mics as well today, so I think we're moving on, if you've got anything, verbally, to update at this point. Yeah, that's fine. Great. Okay, so we'll take that, and we've had your update within the slides. Thank you. That takes us on to Item 9. Before we start the family services update, I would like to thank a note for the whole team, the really good Ofsted review, including outstanding in one of the categories. We are really proud of the work that it's done and thank the team very much. Sorry, I'm having a bit of mic trouble. Okay, so you have the report, so I won't go through it in incredible detail, but just pick out some of the key highlights from the domestic – we'll start with the domestic abuse report. I'm sorry, I'm having some IT challenges this morning, so I'm flicking through paper. Please excuse the noise if it's making on the mic. So you'll see on page 4 that we are – we're halfway through most of our objectives in the domestic abuse and violence against women and girls strategy. We have about a quarter of our actions in progress, and then we have about 20 per cent where we are expecting them to start this year. So those actions are expected to be finalised by the end of March 2025, and that will coincide with the development of our new strategy for domestic abuse involved that we are starting consultation on now, which will run from 2025 to 2028. So, just in terms of the rates, we've just seen the police rates on the domestic abuse, but we are the fourth – we're showing us the fourth lowest rate in London in terms of reported domestic abuse incidents, but we're also showing us the third highest rate in London for positive outcome rates, which used to be known as the sanction and detection rates, so that's positive news for Barnet. We haven't – we've seen some fluctuations in domestic abuse referrals in terms of volume, but I'll come to that in a minute. We've been running some very successful children's groups and we've modified them, so these groups are for parents and for children, to help them overcome their experiences with domestic abuse, and hopefully, break cycles of future generational abuse, and they're delivered through our early help services. Training has continued throughout the quarter, it's still well attended, and we've got some feedback in the report about some of the people that have accessed some of our courses as well. Just on the IRIS program, I think it's important to note on the IRIS program, we still don't have sign-up from a group of GPs, and it's been three years now that we've not been able to engage those GPs in that sign-up. I suppose we have to – we're going to be doing a bit more analysis on whether or not we're still getting referrals from those GP surgeries, because I think that's what we don't know, so we can see the GPs, their surgeries and their volumes of referrals coming in. We have seen a reduction of, I think, it's 13% in quarter one of referrals from GPs, but that's kind of in line with the reduction in referrals for domestic abuse across the board, so we don't know if that's specific to GPs. But we are going to take a closer look at that for quarter two. The Victim and Prisoners Act 2024 received a Royal Assent in May 2024, and that now places a statutory responsibility on police forces to share information with schools about domestic abuse incidents – that's Operation Encompass – and we're working with schools and the police to make sure that that's implemented. As the chair, Councillor Conway, just noted, there's a note in here about the feedback from the Ofsted Inspection of Local Authority Children Services that we had in June, and they recognised that the MARIC was working well and that social work is in our Children and Family Services, understand the domestic abuse impact on children and that it's clearly articulated in assessments and that we're working as an organisation to help parents overcome their experiences of abuse. So, yeah, the MARIC referrals, we've seen a reduction of 30%, quite a significant reduction in MARIC referrals in quarter one. Actually, that's over the last 12 months, not quarter one. But again, it's synonymous with all the other reductions that we're seeing, and we're just interested to know why that's happening. Sixty-one percent of our MARIC referrals are around physical violence in the relationship, which is linked to the high-risk nature of the MARIC in any event. So we have prevention fund that's enabling us to deliver some training, and we've been doing workshops for practitioners and residents and partner organisations around hate crime involved. And there's a study in there about the work that was done with resources for autism and barnet men cap. We have 20 professionals and volunteers attend that. So that's positive and we'll continue rolling those out. There's some case studies in there from victims, and I think what they're doing is highlighting the courses that we are running for victims and survivors, that they're having an impact, that they're helping women feel safer and to develop confidence to hopefully not go in to stay safe from abusive relationships and hopefully not repeat those cycles of victimisation. So we've invited SOLIS because the reduction in referrals, and we've also seen a reduction in the uptake. So the number of women or victims that have referred to SOLIS for help and support, there's a larger percentage in this quarter of cases being declined, and we're curious about why that is. So we're inviting them to come to the quarter two, that will be reported in quarter two. They'll be coming to the next board to help us understand the rationale behind their decision making for referrals. Good to note that we've had a fourth Barnet Refuge open. It's been opened by the Iranian Kurdish Women's Rights Organisation, has eight bed spaces for single Middle Eastern, North African and Afghan women who are fleeing domestic abuse. So really positive to see that additional resource in the borough. And I think the one-stop shop, we're still seeing good multi-agency working through the one-stop shop, and we're still seeing good footfall through that service. We can see that the links to housing, the links to temporary accommodation, I think they're a bit of a challenge. I don't think we have housing colleagues here today, but that's a bit of a challenge because lots of women who are fleeing domestic abuse want to leave, want to stay in the local area, and we don't have properties in the area to enable them to stay. I feel like we should all stand up for something. So we're working with housing to have a look at how we can determine priority around those women and children that need to stay in the borough, and those that could move out of the borough. But we're also considering ideas around perpetrators leaving the property and making sure that they're the ones that are going to TA rather than children, causing more disruption. Okay, so the perpetrator programme, so the CIFA programme, we've only got funding until, it's been very successful in rolling that out across the other ten boroughs, really good partnership working there. Unfortunately, we don't have agreement for funding beyond March 2025 at this point, so it will be a shame to lose that provision. It's really making a difference, and every time we hear from perpetrators who are using the programme, they give such strong and positive feedback about the way that it's considering domestic abuse in a cultural context. So we hope after the autumn budget statement that we might get some news on potential funding for next year, but maybe I'm being optimistic. So you can see here in the report that the volume of domestic violence prevention notices and domestic violence prevention orders that have been granted, and the number of Claire's law disclosures and outcomes, and that's on a steady pace. As you know, we've launched the Safe Haven pilot in March, and we are now at the point of review, so that's been live for six months now, so we're having a review of how that's working, so we're linking with those three premises that have the Safe Haven tools and stickers to look at what impact that's having, whether people are aware of what it is, and whether people are using it, and whether there's a need for us to roll that out in certain premises across the rest of the borough. So that's happening now, that review. Any questions on domestic abuse involved before I move on to reducing offending? Sorry, if I could just say a couple of things. One is I think it would be really helpful for councillors to understand, with solace, and why certain things aren't being progressed. Sorry, I know myself, I refer residents there, so I think that would be really helpful to have some sort of communication back on that. In terms of the Safe Haven assessment, I think we agreed that we'd do that through the winter period, because we think that there might be more take-up starting to happen as it gets darker earlier. In terms of CIFA, the administration very strongly supports its continuation, and if there's any sort of letter or communication you need from the chair, I'm very happy to do that. And lastly, I would suggest maybe Barnet Homes, when they're next here, if they can give us an update on how the accreditation process is going. I think it would be helpful if we could note that. Yep, thank you very much. Does anyone have any questions or comments on this section? No? Okay, thank you. So, just on to reducing offendings. In similarity, the Youth Justice Plan also does feel like a good time to be updating strategies at the moment, so the Youth Justice Plan is, we've just produced our annual report for last year, that was taken to the Overview and Scrutiny Committee, and we are now working on developing our Youth Justice Plan for 2025 to 2026 or 7, and that will be in production, it will need to go to full council for sign-off next year, so we'll be working with partners to develop that. So we're in Year 2 of our current strategy and this report provides an update on quarter one. I mean, it's all pretty positive in as much as Barnet's first-time entry rates is lower than London and the national averages, reoffending rates are lower than London and the national averages, and our custody rates are also lower. So the Barnet Youth Offending Service is doing a pretty good job on supporting young people to stay out of the criminal justice system through their out-of-court disposals and prevention programmes, and also to make sure that when those young people are coming into the system, that we reduce the risk of recidivism for those young people. So, yeah, it's a pretty positive story. So, in the quarter one Youth Justice Management Board, we focused on tackling disproportionality. It's acknowledged that we have disproportionality in our Youth Justice cohort. You can see from the data that we've got on page 18, which is about the young people's arrest and disposal statistics, and overwhelmingly we see a larger proportion of young black males. The stop and search is starting to improve, those numbers are going down, but the arrest is still higher. What we don't understand is what happens at charge, so we can't see if there's disparity at the charging point, so we know that we have more young black people arrested, but do they get the same outcomes at the point of charging? So we've asked the Youth Justice Police to help us try and understand that picture a little bit clearer, but we can see through the report that they are more likely to be charged for an offence, and less likely to be handed down an out-of-court disposal, so we do know that, but what we can't see is the tariff of offending, so we can't see whether black boys are just being arrested for more serious crimes, and therefore are not appropriate for out-of-court disposals, so that's a further piece of work that the Youth Justice Board and partners will be completing. So we know already we've tackled, we've spent a lot of time as a partnership tackling exclusions of black boys from education, and we've been able to bring that number down, so we knew back in 2021 when we started this work that black boys were more than twice as likely to have an exclusion than white children in Barnet schools, and as a local authority, Barnet had a higher rate of exclusions of black boys than other boroughs in north London, so we've had a tackling disproportionality groups tackle that, and we've reduced that, so it feels more balanced now, although we're seeing different children now being subject to exclusion, so we're keeping an eye on those particular groups, and suspensions, and that's part of the work that Chris is doing with schools as well, to have a look at those young people who are being suspended but not permanently excluded. We're also focused on our young people who are not in education, employment and training, and when we looked at our cohort, we could see of our need, the not education, employment training cohort, 66% of them were male, and 58% of them were from black and other minority ethnic groups, so we've got disparity and disproportionality in that group as well, so we can see it right through the youth justice system. Similarly, transfers to probation, 80% of the boys, they were all boys that were transferred in the year to June 2024, 80% of them were from black and other minority backgrounds, and what we don't yet understand is at what point were they arrested and what charges they had, and what was the kind of trigger for transferring to probation, so we need to just understand some of that detail a little bit clearer. Just to let you know that we have a, there's a Pan London stop and search pilot, it was launched in Haringey as a pilot about a year or so ago, Haringey council worked with the police and they dip sampled groups of children who were subject to stop and search to identify vulnerabilities in that particular group. We don't ordinarily, hadn't ordinarily received police notifications for children that are subject to stop and search, and what that audit found was that the children, some of these children were children that were in care, that had additional vulnerabilities, and the systems around those children were not being informed about these incidents, which meant that support couldn't be given to those children, so together with the police and Haringey they've launched a campaign across London, so it's now a Pan London pilot, and Barnet alongside colleagues across London are going to be doing dip sample or dips on our own stop and search children, and feed into that wider piece of work, and hopefully that will create a national change. I do have a question about that, but, and also the proportionality of it, and as long as, I know you're looking at it from, in terms of ethnic background, race, are you also looking at it in the context of disability, so I'm thinking about diverse, neurodiversity and mental health? The Haringey findings showed that there was a disproportionate number of children with SCN, EHCP, so there are vulnerabilities in this cohort of children, but we also know that the children that are in the justice system are similarly, they're over represented if they've got EHCP, so social communication difficulties in particular, so yeah. So we'll let you know how that goes, so we're just starting that now, and that's being led by Di Dave La Riviere and Cezanne from our youth justice team, so they're representing us in that piece of work. Tina, can I suggest maybe they come to a future board meeting to present on that at an appropriate time, I think would be good, because that would follow on from the report that you did last year, so do you want to, yeah, go ahead Ray. Thanks Chair, I just wanted to ask Tina, because I know we've asked before about the numbers of autistic young people that you might be, the teams might be working with, and the issues they face, I mean that's something we're keen on, both from the safeguarding adult board's point of view and developing the autism strategy, and I was just wondering if somebody perhaps could come to the access to justice subgroup where we could go through that in more detail, I think it would be really helpful, we've got one in early December, and I suppose I'd be keen especially to be looking at the pathways we've got from either autistic people who are offending, autistic people who are victims of crime, and what pathways have we got to support another working well, because there's a lot of support out there, it's just making sure that those pathways are working effectively, so if we could get somebody down to the access to justice group in December that would be great, thanks. It might be something that our clinical, we've got a clinical psychologist in the team and she's working largely with that, so I'll, please send me the dates and I'll forward the invite to her, and if she can't come I'm sure somebody else from the team will. So we also had a look at our restorative justice and victims programmes, that's been working really, really well, so we're working with young people to help them make reparations for their crimes and make contact with victims and write letters of apology and or meet with victims to, so we're holding restorative conferencing, so we're having, interestingly, a number of victims don't want to engage in that process, but the young people are being encouraged to write those letters even if the victims don't want to receive them, so that they are thinking about the consequences of their actions and the impact that their crimes have on the victims, so that's been a positive piece of work. We've got lots of young people involved in community reparation and we've had five new sites set up in Quarter 1, so we've got Edgware, Library, Little Village, Second Chance, Chipping and Osage Libraries are now sites for our young people to get involved, and we're giving young people AQA certificates, so that's recognised as part of their achievements as well, which has been really positive. We've given 112 of AQA certificates in Quarter 1, so lots of certificates being given out. Okay, so there's some stuff around, some online materials that have been published, and there's a link for you to have a look at that, and we'll report in Quarter 2 on the Youth Justice Residential, another successful residential in Surrey, I think we were this time, but that was really positive, and we've been working with an Olympian, BMEXA, who's been delivering a programme in the borough, him and his brothers and his father run a company now, teaching track racing skills, and it's focused on black young boys. That's been really positively received, so we hope we can continue that partnership if we have available funding. So the last part is on the Integrated Offender Management and the Reducing Offending Delivery Group, so the IOM, the stats are all reported within the report. We've been looking at the transition for young people, recognising, and we were talking about this in this Youth Justice Matters Board that we just had yesterday, there's definitely a gap between young people coming out of the youth justice system and then something happens in those intervening years before they end up in IOM, where they're now persistent, violent, prolific offenders, so we don't know what's happening in that space for those young people because there's not many services connected to them post-18. So we're trying to understand how we can make that better for those young adults. So we can see that in Quarter 4, we didn't have the Quarter 1 data for this year, but in Quarter 4 we saw violence moving to the top of the offences for IOM, which had taken over from theft in Quarter 3, but as expected, drugs, weapons, robbery are all in those top five categories. Okay, so I think that's all from me on this one. Thank you. Any questions? Thank you very much. Are there any questions at all? Any further? No? Great, thank you. So that's for noting. And then we move on to Item 10, which is Update to Serious Violence Duty and Violence Reduction Plan, which Chris Kelly is going to take us through. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Again, I would refer my colleagues and yourself, Chair, to the report and also the Violence Reduction Plan that's contained within the documents. I thought it'd be helpful just to highlight some key achievements, really, and kind of key outputs that we've seen over the last quarter. So starting kind of on Page 5, under Governance, we continue to have a really strong partnership arrangements to join up, both strategically and also operationally as well. Very much it's evidenced through the various panels and also strategic groups in terms of TTCG, MACE, CS MARAC, and also problem-solving groups as well, which really seeks to establish a understanding of the presenting needs and themes that are emerging and then also around kind of the actions in terms of mitigating risk around violence and also exploitation as well. A regularly distributing information in terms of our key partners as well in a proportionate way, support awareness, raising kind of the outward focus in terms of our partners understanding the local issues within communities and things as well, and also then being really kind of clear in terms of how they can raise further concerns that either, for example, their schools or various groups and young people that are raising know where to report back to. In terms of analysis and enforcement, we have a range of obviously police-led operations to address kind of localised needs. Again, a lot of that is identified through the partnership and governance arrangements that we have around kind of strategic meetings and also operational meetings as well. We've obviously heard from MPS colleagues around some of the successes that they've had over the last quarter around the reduction of violence against the persons, which has seen an 11% decrease, and also in terms of a decrease of violence against persons with injury as well. We have seen during call to soup one, which has already been discussed and highlighted, an increase around kind of knife crime offences, but that is not in relation to injury, and we feel that that is really just a potential impact of the increased operations and presence that we have within the communities at the moment. So we are very kind of keen in terms of targeting kind of areas that we are aware of that are linked in relation to kind of violence and things, and one of the things that we are doing in relation to that is obviously then triangulating and galvanising our outreach programmes and also our My Ends project when it comes online and also the Safer Schools Robbery Safety Initiative as well. We will see kind of increased activity in call to two around Project HADR as well, which again is predominantly a police-led but is also a partnership initiative as well, which will look at kind of a holistic way in which drugs are being tackled and also the associated crimes as well, so that would be something that would be reported back on in terms of next quarter. In terms of reducing access to weapons, we continue to work with our Barnet Education and Learning Service to track excluded and suspended young people, certainly where there has been some indications around either kind of weapons carrying or violence within the context of schools as well, and really kind of one of the things that leads to is targeting around their Restorative Justice hub and coordinating them will go into the schools and try to work with them in relation to pulling around kind of restorative conversations with young people, and also that it then leads to additional development around training, workforce development and stuff like that as well. What we've seen around our Restorative Justice over the last quarter is that they've gone into four schools with a total of 102 participants that have been involved in training, and at the moment what's happened is that that has then resulted in them actually taking on kind of more of a restorative conversations between people, between staff members and also young people as well, and then looking at kind of some forms of mediation and restorative meetings in relation to that as well. In terms of our outreach and detached, so looking at the activity which is occurring around that, during quarter one we've had 67 sessions where we've had our outreach workers that have been targeting and being present within our communities. That's totaled 201 hours of delivery, and during that time we have reached 186 young people, and we're finding, similar to the previous year really, that the majority of engagement is with males, so that's around 56% certainly during quarter one, and that the primary age group that we appear to be engaging with and that are also receptive in relation to engagement is around that 12 to 15 age group as well, which we're quite positive around as it offers potential diversionary work, especially when you look at the strategic needs assessment and actually our higher range cohort in terms of violence and stuff tends to be class 18 as well, so we're hoping that it will lead to diversionary work in relation to that. Some of the themes that emerged from the outreach work obviously get reflected back in terms of the governance arrangements and the range of meetings that we have, so examples of that is around of course CS MARAC and strategic base, and one of the positives that have come out from that as well is that we have found an unusual and unexpected theme of young people actually expressing an interest to becoming peer mentors and also becoming outreach workers themselves, which has been really, really good. So what we are really excited about is that that dovetails really beautifully into our Mayans projects, which will be coming online certainly in quarter two, which will then look at developing peer mentors and also kind of helping expand the outreach program as well, so we will have some continuity around the delivery of that over the course of the next year. Is that the project with Arts Against Knives as well? It is indeed, yeah. So I think coming from a background in the youth sector that that is really, really welcome in terms of young people being able to step forward and encourage others is fantastic, thanks. I just wanted to check it was that project, thank you. So the other part, just to link to that as well, is that our after school safety initiative projects, which is looking at tackling kind of localised robberies, certainly within our transport hubs, we have started to mobilise and come online in relation to that during quarter one through our partnership with NPS. So that has been through the marking of mobile phones, we've begun to get in contact and be present within our schools as well, and also to raise awareness around that. And we've just appointed the two workers that will then be mobilised to actually be providing the community safety aspect and then also around the outreach aspect within our transport hubs, and it's expected they will start in quarter two. So working with our communities, we continue to deliver around our contextual training. So that is both to our VCS partners, grassroots organisations, as well as partners as well, and that we also continue to have a substantial and comprehensive wraparound in terms of when serious incidents do occur. So what we are able to do is look at attending and facilitating a range of community impact meetings where there have been incidents of violence, and to then be looking at coordinating the input through our violent integrated clinical service, and then also any other support charities, businesses that can potentially help support around the collective and individual kind of trauma and emotional impact around that. In terms of building on the victim's care hub, quarter one had seen a total of 54 referrals, which is forecast to be well over what we had intended to deliver, and clearly there is a significant demand in relation to the victim's care hub. We're seeing that the type of referrals are really coming from a range of different partners, but children and young people services, of course, community safety, police, and we're really focused at the moment on promoting greater awareness around the victim's care hub in terms of housing colleagues as well, and that's because there's been a range of coordinating meetings over quarter one, which has kind of indicated vulnerability of housing tenants, which has then resulted in coordinated activity, and we want to make sure that there is a comprehensive support there for the victim as well. Just I made a referral myself last week, and that was something I was fortunate to go on a ride along with the police response team, and so I think it would be helpful to join up there, actually, for some of those cases to increase awareness of the support hub, because it proved very useful, and it was very useful to be able to offer that support. Thank you, Councillor. I'll make sure that it's prioritised. Thank you, and also, you know, thanks to the team, both on restorative justice and the victim support hub, who responded incredibly quickly to that. Thank you. In terms of kind of the nature of the referrals, we find that the majority of referrals are around crime prevention, in terms of kind of general things, and then the next area which we are seeing quite significant demand on is in relation to victims of common assault and also knife crime as well, and then around exploitation, so specifically around criminal exploitation. We see, in terms of the breakdown around those 54 referrals, 34 of those were adults, 24 of those were children, and again, we're seeing more males that are engaging in the context of that service and stuff as well, so 32 males which we were working with in terms of victims. And I'll hold there for any questions from colleagues. I guess just an observation for me, I know the duty kind of goes up to 25 in terms of interventions. I noticed that a lot of the kind of outreach work, diversionary work, kind of stopped at 18, and just in the kind of language, it's around kind of young people. I'm kind of wondering what focus we have as an authority around young adults and those 18 to 25s, particularly around, you talked a lot about the kind of educational piece, how far are we into FE colleges and to some degree, some universities where people are coming in with that kind of serious violence piece post 18. So in terms of restorative justice, we have begun to work with Middlesex University and that we do have existing links in terms of Barnett and Southgate as well. What I was going to say, with the outreach side of things, it's really interesting because the project is actually scoped to be working with also and engaging with young adults up to the age 25 as well, and we continue to try and engage with our plus 18 cohorts when out and about. And there is a reluctance in relation to that, however, the workers are continuing and they are absolutely aware that they need to continue to try and engage in terms of that age group. So I guess how do we, from a probation service, we're dealing with those adults, how do we engage in that process and ensure that our young people know that these services exist locally? Sorry, could you repeat that just a second? That's okay. So from a probation perspective, where we're often working with these young people as both perpetrators and victims, how do we ensure that we can promote the accessibility to those services locally? So I think that it's around making sure that there's an awareness within probation in terms of what services and local services are around. What we can do is that there is kind of a community directory which has been pulled around as part of the needs assessment for the serious violence duty as well, which outlines a range of kind of youth provisions that were focused around supporting young people, around awareness of weapons and violence and things as well. That can absolutely be shared and I can ping the crossover to your workers and things as well. The other thing as well with that is that we also try to ensure that kind of the adults risk panel is coordinating some of that activity for also those young adults and things that we're worried about in terms of violence as well. And my final question Chris, sorry to be pleased to know, will the kind of intervention such as that kind of peer mentoring that you've talked about be available to that 80s/25 cohort as well? So we are really kind of focused in terms of looking at trying to expand on universal offers around mentoring for that older age group. At the moment there is a bit of a gap as kind of highlighted by Tina around the IOM cohort as well, post 18 to them becoming a little bit older and that's something that we're really focused on in terms of looking at what potential opportunities there are in terms of funding and projects and around also how we can effectively engage and help continue to promote different trajectories for that group as well. Thank you and it does sound like an area for future work for co-production with young people as well and I can see Tina's got a hand up and there might be more we want to pick up in the private bit of the meeting as well, thank you. I'm just thinking Karim that when we get information about London Crime Prevention Fund because the ex-offender mentoring service that we have that's attached to the IOM that's funded through the London Crime Prevention Fund and we haven't yet, correct me if I'm wrong Matt, we haven't yet had any requests, we haven't been given the amount that we've got available to us for the next three years yet and all of that funding is part of that funding suite that runs out in March 25, but when and if we get an invitation to set out what we'd like to deliver over the next three years we could certainly, I think because we know that we've got this gap that we could extend that programme to younger probation cohorts, so young adult cohort that's open to probation, not just specifically IOM. Yeah because IOM is only 25% of the young people on IOM and they are a specific group of individuals that actually get a lot of support in other areas anyway, but I'm thinking more broadly about the generic caseload as you've highlighted and we do have loads of young adults on our caseload that are not IOM. I think it's something we definitely need to look closer into together and with certain local partners as well. I think Matt wants to say something, thanks. Yeah, chair, unfortunately we received apologies from Alice Bird from MOPAC for this meeting, the two items that I was hoping Alice could give us an update on, I've chased it in the background via email, is number one, Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London is currently out to local authorities consulting on the police and crime plan that has to be published by the 31st of March of next year, 2025, in previous funding streams for the local crime prevention fund, which is the sole money that is being referred to in this matter, we were given quite short notice for submission of bids, which Chris and I completed, so what I've asked is, number one, could we try if possible please and have some kind of earlier prior notice so we can bring it to elected members and colleagues to determine what we would like to propose to use that funding for and two, could you try and indicate as best as you can, allowing for the current circumstances nationally, what that funding, grant funding offer is likely to be and what you would wish for, excuse me, London and specifically Barnet local authorities to seek to invest in and what would be your running time for that. The problem that we have with grant funding, especially from grant funding streams such as MOPAC is, it's often decided in quite short notice for those agencies or those services to then make that grant submission, so we can plan but we can't predict and that is a vulnerability for us from the work streams that we're doing already. Having said that, we've put that representation in, I've asked Alice via email yesterday, okay you can't come, could you please try and give us some kind of indication and I'll carry that on as a piece in the background and obviously brief, Claire and Dec according. Very much so, I'd also like to note just how well the relationship between the different departments in the council is working, particularly the two of you and the bids that have come through this year, I'm aware that it's a healthy challenge that we all give ourselves in the way things are constructed in Barnet and I think it's very welcome. I also have squibbled a note myself on the MOPAC issue, I'm very happy to take that up, we're very happy to take that up as an administration and if there's any appropriate meetings, letters etc, we can have a chat afterwards about that, thank you. I didn't have anything else to add, Councillor. Thank you very much, that was really detailed and obviously a very important area of work for everybody and thank you for the questions as well, so we note that and we move on to item 11 which is the hate crime update, thank you. Thank you very much. I hope you've always had an opportunity to read the report, I'm sure you're very aware of what's been happening nationally with the riots, all of which mostly was driven by fake news, misinformation. We've seen a rise of over 200% in anti-Semitism in Barnet alone since the October conflict that began last year and one third of all anti-Semitism across London happens in Barnet as well, so we've got together things, there's a focus, we need to be focusing on community cohesion. One of those areas I think is tackling hate crimes, so together with Councillor Conway, the comms team, myself, lots of different areas across the local authority, we've been looking at how can we in some way drive or tackle hate crime. This report really just brings together what we're doing currently and this is just the start, there's lots of things happening in the future, we've got the Hate Crime Awareness Week coming up in October, there is a comms campaign will be starting right on the back of that, we also have a Hate Crime Summit that is also planned for early October and really I just want to highlight some of the areas in here, some of the things we're doing at the moment across the local authority, the community safety team, one of the priorities is access to justice for people who are victims of hate crime really just to ensure that people feel comfortable and confident in reporting their hate crimes. Myself, the hate crime lead obviously and I do a lot of work with schools, early intervention, classroom settings, bullying, discrimination, resilience about hatred, online we have lots of funding come from the SCF now, lots of the shared endeavour funding which has seen a lot of organisations and I hope at the next meeting I have some outcomes of those deliveries, many of that, much of that, in fact not all of it, is happening within schools looking at anti-discrimination, hate crime, online resilience, critical thinking, that kind of thing, the task and finish group I think I've just mentioned and we will have a bit more information on that comms update I believe a bit later on, we've got someone from comms going to give a bit more detail about that summit and the campaign. We have the Hate Crime Awareness Campaign at the beginning, the Community Capacity Project that has just finished, I'm hoping to have some outcomes from that as well, obviously we have Ray representing, Mencap here as well with the Zero Tolerance to Hate Crime Projects and I think you might be given a quick update when I finish this, is that ok? I know we've got a great opportunity there now, Fayez is doing absolute wonders at Mencap there. We have the Family Services as well, the Resources Toolkit that Tina shared with us at an earlier meeting that I've been sharing with schools and other professionals, etc, etc. With our partners, the police as well, there's a lot of focus I think on some of those events that are tied to the Palestine and Israel conflict as well, Michael Buckley as well, we've been very much engaged with local authority, with Ray, with Fayez, with the comms team really so we can just work together to drive and tackle this head on. There's a Why Me campaign video, there's a new video for immigrants or unaccompanied young people, it's just been launched as well, 22 local authorities have come together to put that together, one of those videos focuses on, in over 100 languages, focuses on the justice system as well, so we're hoping that people have the confidence to come forward, report more so we can understand a lot more. The Safer Spaces Scheme as well, again another thing that has been driven by the community, the zero project, zero tolerance to hate crime projects, and really just going forward, this is not where it stops, this is where it starts, anyone who has any thoughts or comments or suggestions of how we can improve reporting more than anything else, we know that hate crime isn't one of the massively unreported crimes, any way we can ease that, we're looking at maybe expanding the reporting centres, a couple of mosques I think are interested in opening or at least developing some hate crime reporting there, I do believe I think Islamophobia, I mean Barney is very much underreported as well, so anyone, we're always open to suggestions, ideas, input, engagement, anything that can help us improve. Yes? It's not an idea that came from me, but we ran a focus group with our sleepers a couple of weeks ago, and they commented that in response to the Southport incident that led to a large rise across everyone, including in Barnet, in potential risks, everything closed and they were left really very vulnerable with nowhere to go, and asked that in future if you're doing emergency planning, that actually those who are sleeping in our borough feature into that, because they felt very vulnerable, left without any access to services, so I said I'd raise it here. Okay, so what group was that in particular? That's individuals who are sleeping rough in the borough. Okay, homeless, yes, very good point, very good point as well, and I think to be aware as well, we do have five hotels in Barnet that are housing asylum seekers, and much of the rights happening around the country, I mean, I say isolated, there were isolated incidents last year on a much smaller scale where people turned up in the hundreds, you know, angry, and because of fake news, you know, they're living five-star lifestyles while we are freezing or living on the streets, so yes, certainly homeless people, thank you. Fiona, I think if you could put that in writing as well, that would be really helpful, because what we're trying to do collectively is to start a conversation with all communities on this, so that the summit that's been proposed by officers that we're bringing together covers a range of different people coming to that first meeting, there will also be an opportunity for a discussion online, and the whole idea is that we start this conversation this October to co-produce with our communities where we go on this together. What has come very strongly as well, because my portfolio covers, and we deliberately constructed it like this, community safety and resident participation, so there's been a whole programme of round tables that we've been doing anyway through the year, as well as the leader listens, etc., and so there's a very keen sense from local communities, not that we just don't just look at hate crime, but that we look at community cohesion and we actually celebrate, highlight, extend the initiatives that run anyway across our borough, and I think I will always be this balancing voice, but I think the response in Finchley from meeting with the local communities, from the fact that it was possible for the multi-faith forum to go in collectively and address Friday prayers, all of the informal outreach that's happened, the support for asylum seekers locally, etc., we're not complacent, but it has been extraordinary and very encouraging alongside the very difficult figures and time that it has been for communities in this borough. I will do that, I will set out, because actually the people we spoke with were very complimentary about other aspects of support as well that they do see and can access, it was just that specific gap, and they understood, they understood why libraries closed, why everyone closed, because of safety issues, it's just they wanted to ensure that in future, so no, I'll do a summary of that whole discussion actually and fold it onto you so you can include that in the future. That would be really helpful, because there's obviously homeless action in various people and places, okay, came to mind as somewhere that we could do separate listening and discussions with. I'm also conscious that the police after that whole operation sent us all as partners, what do you think was missing, what could we do differently, I think we all operate a learning by doing approach as well, and are always interested in knowing what is and isn't working, which is part of this as well, is to look at how we kind of review things, keep things different, work with communities going forward, so thank you. I wanted to give a specific update really on the zero tolerance to hate crime part of things, because we have had a problem over the last year in that we did have a vacant pulse for about six months, so that did impact on the project. What we've done now is we've filled it, we've filled it temporarily, now we've just filled it permanently and someone's about to start. Where I'd say it's caused particular problems is that it meant we haven't had the programme of training and workshops, and there's been less support for the hate crime reporting census, and that's certainly I'd say impacted on the number of reports, so that's one of the things that we need to catch up on now, we've got people backing the post, and I'd say the census especially we use in the hate crime week as a way to kind of reinvigorate them. I think there's things they can do during the week that would promote themselves both to their own staff and to other users as well, so it has been a difficult period, and we do appreciate itself as being a time when hate crime has been very much to the fore, but we're ready to catch up now. Thank you. That's very welcome to hear because part of it is to refresh what was there before in terms of the hate champions network and newsletter and all of that kind of thing. I think a lot of people stand ready to help and to be part of something very positive locally, so that's great. I think I now need to read out, I don't need to read out the whole thing, thanks, that's a great relief to everybody, so we're just noting the recommendations and thanking everybody. That takes us on to item 12 which is the combatting drugs partnership update. I would note that in this area we try to work very closely together, we also operate learning by doing. I think the addition of Project Adda to the borough this year is making a really welcome contribution as well. Are we starting with Councilor Moore? I don't mind, but thank you both for being here, and Louisa as well who I think is online and we wish you well. Thanks. Thank you Chair. I will just introduce Louisa who will present the report and to highlight it is an annual report, an update, but also presenting the new structure of the combatting drugs partnership board for your information and noting how we'll continue working. And I'll hand over to Louisa, I hope she's feeling better today. Thank you very much Louisa and for joining us despite not being well which is really appreciated. I think the new structure is very welcome because I know when we've been at meetings it has often felt like there isn't enough time to discuss in depth certain things. I think one thing I would add is Operation Woodson which has been underway this year in Buntoke and the very close working relationship and cooperation between the police, community safety, youth outreach and Change Grow Live with very clear offer of support as well as enforcement going on there which I think is really appreciated by everyone and actually has had several conversations with communities locally about that as well so I think it's a wider education piece that happens. I think Councilor Moore would like to add something as well, thank you. I just wanted to firstly start by thanking all the officers both within the council and actually across partners because while we haven't had absolutely consistent presence at our board meetings, actually we really have done quite well compared with some of our other borough authorities in terms of getting partners around the table and it spans right the way across council departments such as public health and children's and family services. Housing very importantly have been engaging but the reality is that they're formal meetings and the real meat of the work goes on through those relationships that are built outside those formal meetings so I absolutely do support the reduction of the formal meetings to two a year. I was very clear though that they needed to be aligned with the schedules of dates for Health and Wellbeing Board and Safe Community Partnership Board because this is the public and transparent reporting of that work that we are able to report in public and it's also really important that timing gives input to strategic decision making by those two boards as well. So I support it but I want to make sure that that's aligned and also enjoy partners to really pick up the baton in terms of leading on that work. You've talked around the table today about some really good working across departments within and beyond the council, across police, with probation and a range of others and so I think it's another case where it's very much more than the sum of the parts and so it's about making use of the resources, sometimes scarce that we have, making sure it's targeted into the right place to get the very best for our local residents, particularly those who are struggling to get their lives back on track. Thanks very much. I should note also I bumped into Change Grow Live yesterday as well while I was out and about and spoke to them about working with us possibly as volunteers with a listening session around the development of the VORG and DA strategy that actually came from them and a chat and an offer so I was going to bring that up too. I think Claire's got something you'd like to add, thank you. Thank you Chair. Thanks, it's really good to see an update on how the partnership is working and all of the results. I know various colleagues around the table are involved in. With regards to the new structure, I think it looks like a really good structure going forward. I'd just like to add that we probably need to add in the overview and scrutiny on the top level of that chart because we have Crime and Disorder overview and scrutiny annually in the summer and last year Louisa did attend with an update from the Combat and Drugs Partnership so in terms of absolute oversight it would kind of feed into that, that sits across health and wellbeing board and to the Community Safety Partnership. It's a challenge I think, that's obviously very sensible. Thank you very much. I know we all sit in a lot of meetings but there is a really strong collaborative approach here across partners and all officers and it's really very welcome. Councillor Warren? If I might just, I should have said it when I was thanking officers, actually just a recognition that some of the work has been presented at Pan London and wider bodies as well so there is broader recognition of some of the work that's going on, particularly with young people. Great, thank you. So we note that as in the report and then we move on to our final item which is safety in parts. I would like to note two things here just before I hand over to Cassie. One is that this actually came from a comment originally from Overview and Scrutiny Committee who were wanting to see some, I think they were looking at they were going to do some stuff on parts but actually it worked with work we wanted to do so that link is really important and the dialogue with all councillors and I'd also like to thank my colleague Councillor Schneiderman for his work and his input on this because a cabinet system enables us to work very collaboratively as a team as well so that's really appreciated too. Thank you Cassie. Thank you Cassie. I think also to pick up on what you said about the volunteering groups and the incredible way in which residents sort of are active in our green spaces. I think often when I'm asked what do you mean by resident participation, it's very much how residents choose to engage and I think some of the way people feel safer certainly from having been on sort of some of the Friends litter picks and all of that sort of stuff in Burntoke and wider is because they're going together and there's a sense of community that you know something that starts as a litter pick transforms into something completely different with the connections locally which is really wonderful to see and I think there's been such a growth in that in the past few years in the borough. I've not been to the green spaces forum actually for a while so if it's helpful to sort of go to that, that was a meeting I used to go to quite a bit so if you'd like me to go okay in this sort of role that would be great. I don't know if anyone's got any questions or comments. Lots here, go ahead. Thanks chair, thanks Cassie. It's been a really detailed piece of work so thanks very much for coordinating it and everybody that's been involved. The one thing I just wasn't sure which I just wanted to check for clarity really which isn't included in the report necessarily or the recommendations but we have spoken about it previously was around where we've got venues in parks such as cafes etc etc just looking at what the leases or contracts that we have so if for example they you know the operating hours whether there's antisocial behaviour or any safety concerns linked with a venue what kind of conditions we have and I know that you said that would be a wider review I just didn't want to lose it in this piece of work. Thank you, I think that would be great because also once I understand what you're saying and I've had conversations myself with the estates team at points it's also very much about protecting the people that are taking those leases on as well so it's not just a prohibitive thing it's there to try and keep everybody safer and I think in certain situations would be very welcome. Declan. Thank you chair, just very quickly to mention that one of the big issues that we had and we were trying to work through was the public's perception of safety in the parks because it doesn't necessarily mean that parks are unsafe it's just that they feel unsafe or look unsafe and that's what the feel is. As you know we're working on patrols etc which will help with that high visibility presence we've got a couple of high visibility vans coming on board within the next couple of weeks yes that's right and that's coming away that will obviously feed into the results of what's going on and we'll keep Tabs and keep Cassie involved with that and how we're doing that and just to add that our police colleagues are also involved with the parks because they use our PSPO tickets as well so they're out there and this is all hopefully going to add to the perception of the parks being a much safer place. I think I'll just add as well that the reason we brought in a PSPO across the borough and the provisions there was very much from listening to residents on doorsteps across the borough and in the parks too so it's you know it's something that was developed very much with an item to all of that. I'm sure we'll be hearing more about the vehicles that are coming soon to our parks I know that's been a very long-term project by the council as well thank you very much Cassie to you Matt and all the team for your work on this thank you so we note that report. The forward work programme I don't know if anybody's got anything oh sorry Fiona just the safeguarding adults board annual review will need to be probably at the next meeting if that's at all possible just because then I'll be able to present it that's November the 29th yep could you send us an email just so we pick that up yeah thank you that's great does anyone have any other business of course wow I'll just switch the mic two very quickly things of this too but I will be really brief what both good news I think first one initially when I started back in 2017 the police raised concerns that there wasn't a tiny appropriate adult service for adults obviously children and families pay for and support young people who are brought into custody but there's no legal requirement for anybody to do that for adults. MOPAC have finally agreed to fund it and it will start in January 2025 Ray and I are meeting with the lead to look at KPIs and what could be reported to locally around the impact and how that's working so hopefully that'd be really welcome news to your custody officers it's definitely welcome news for our client base because they're brought into custody they should get more timely support the other bit of news I thought I'm sorry I'm stealing your Thundergreen but I think it's I've heard some very good things about the SDS 40 release earlier this month I have and I thought it might be oh so the prison release that happened earlier and I thought so I just wondered if we could have I know that the London they're looking at are there lessons to be learned and to because obviously there's another release in October but generally I wondered if we could have the highlights to the next meeting or something thank you very much so that both welcome bits of good news of course we will be talking in the private bit of the meeting about how that first face has gone and lessons done because it's something we're keeping a very close eye on so I think that would need to be a discussion as to what it's possible to bring to the next meeting what it is and and other routes for sharing that but thank you for raising that that's great so the next meeting is on the 29th of September so November we're in September so right it's certainly very busy and we'll see everybody then and thank you all very much for the contributions and thank you to everyone online thank you thank you you you [ Silence ]

Transcript

Hello, good morning, welcome. I'm Councillor Sara Conway, Chair of the Safer Communities Partnership Board. Thank you for attending our meeting this morning, both in the room and online. Please note that meetings may be recorded and broadcast by people present as allowed for in-law or by the Council. Can I please remind the board to use the microphone when speaking by pressing the middle speaker icon. Press once to turn it on and once to turn it off. We ask that you remain seated throughout the meeting unless you are called to the table to address the board. I don't think we need everyone to introduce themselves. I do know that my colleague, Councillor Moore, is here, who chairs the Combat and Drugs Partnership Board, and that is so that we can join up the work that the Council is doing on key statutory requirements and generally on community safety. Apologies for absence, I think it's Greg from Barnet Homes, and I think Corinne is going to join us a bit later. Minutes of the previous meeting, does everyone agree with the minutes? Yep, nodding on line two, thank you, so they're agreed. Do any members have any interest to disclose today? Nope, that's great. Public questions and comments, we don't have any. Matters arising, does anybody have anything they need to raise at this point? Nope. So we'll start with the performance update, quarter one, which I think is Declan and Matt and the police as well. I'd like to start, as I often do, by thanking everybody from all the teams for all the work they've been doing in the past quarter. I know it has been difficult, challenging, et cetera, but everybody has done their very best through some particularly difficult situations in the summer, which I also notice the remarkable way our communities have responded to coming together to the, not threat, the difficulties Barnet found itself in. Thank you. Good morning, Councillor, good morning, attendees. The performance dashboard is on the screen behind you, Lieutenant and Councillor Moore. I possibly invite you to rotate your chairs so you don't get a crip neck or you can follow it on your laptops. Just a reminder, next slide, please, Ben. Just a reminder of where the data is sourced from. All of the crime data is taken from the London data website for our monthly crime data dashboard collation and the slides that relate to Barnet Council's assurance group community safety team functions is taken from the community safety team's internal data sources. Next slide, please, Ben. The ranking is self-explanatory. However, for people who haven't visited this meeting before, the ranking structure above is indicative of where we are placed by comparison to our either London colleagues for other boroughs or in relation to our tribe borough colleagues, and our tribe borough being Brent and Harrow. Ben, next slide, please. The next set of slides are actually police performance data. Therefore, chair, with your permission, I'll hand off to my police colleague. Good morning, everyone. I hope you can hear me okay. So I'm going to go over the Berkeley figures in the last three months from April to June, 400 cases of residential Berkeley in Barnet. The previous three months we showed a downward trend of 16 out of the 32 boroughs, but we now have an emerging issue. We're up 22 out of the 32 boroughs. In comparison with the three months last year, we were one out of the three boroughs across the north-west, and that is obviously rising. So from that, there is an increase from 371 burglaries that's gone up to 400, which is up 7.8%. However, the year-to-date figures, the burglary has gone down for the year-to-date figures for that. I'll move on to burglary business and community. Three months from April to June, there were 120 cases of non-residential burglary. We were sitting 13th out of the 32 B.C.U.s. We are now 6th out of the 32, so we have an improving figure for that, and it's a downward trend we're showing. The comparison from the three months previously was that we were in the middle of the three boroughs on north-west, and we're still there, and that hasn't changed. For the non-residential burglaries, we were sitting at 159, and now we're down to 120. That's down 24.5%, but there's no year-to-date figures. It hasn't shown any increase or decrease. We're just static for that. I'll move on to robbery next. Our robbery figures are showing 161 cases of robbery of personal property in Barnet. That was previously nine out of the 32 B.C.U.s, and now we're showing 11. It's an emerging issue for the robbery, and against our other boroughs in north-west, again, we are sitting middle of the road for that. For robbery, it was 166. Previously, we are now 161, so it's down 3%, but overall, the year-to-date figures, we are up slightly with a 5.5% increase in robbery. If we go to violence with injury, three months today, it was 475 cases of violence with injury in Barnet. We were three out of the 32 boroughs, now down to the second-best within the Met, and we're also the best within the actual B.C.U. itself. For violence with injury, we were 572 previously. We are now shown as 475. That is down 17%, and also our year-to-date figures is down 6.8% for our violence with injury. The knife crime with injury, there's 19 cases of knife crime recorded in Barnet. We were six out of the 32 boroughs, now down to the fifth, best in the Met for improving figures, and we are also the best within the B.C.U. itself. For knife crime with injury, it was sitting at 22, and we are down to 19 cases. That's down 13.6%. However, we have got year-to-date figures. We're still up 18.6, but we are looking for that downward trend, which is really positive. Then moving on to our lethal-barrel discharges. There was one case of lethal-barrel discharge in Barnet. Previously, that was 21 of the 32 boroughs. We are now improving on that. We are down to the 12th best within the Met, and we are again the second within the B.C.U. itself. For lethal-barrel discharges, there were three cases previously in the period, and we are now down to one, so that's a 66.7% decrease. The year-to-date figures were also down 84.6% for lethal-barrel discharges. For domestic abuse, there were 146 cases of domestic abuse in Barnet. Of the three months, we were the third out of the Met, and we've actually improved on that number. We're down to the second best in the Met, and also the best within the B.C.U. itself. Previously, there were 178 cases. We are now down to 146 of domestic abuse cases. That's down 18%, and our year-to-date figures are also down 46%. I think I will hand it over to Declan now. Is that right, or Matt? It's my turn again. Thank you very much, Chair. If you are happy, I will proceed now with the anti-social behaviour data for the Borough. As you can see, colleagues, from the slides, the top left is the use of our tools and powers. The top right is fixed penalty notices, where we're tackling anti-social behaviour in the form of environmental crime, and in the bottom right is the community's trigger data. If I could just touch on a few headlines, it's quite obvious there are some uses of tools and powers that have not been used. That's not uncommon. It does depend upon where cases are and who is the lead agency for that case. However, in the current data, what is obvious is the use of the Public Spaces Protection Order has jumped in May, and middle point in June of May's figure, thereabouts. But the reason for that jump is the Community Safety Team annually do a co-operative piece with our Parks colleagues, and we carry out intensive enforcement with the Neighbour Police and Team and the Community Safety Team. We do it through the week, Councillor, but we also have an enhanced focus at the weekends and on Friday evenings. A lot of those offences, without going too granular for you, are linked to set open spaces where people misuse barbecues or park in such a way that they cause obstructions for other people to be able to use those facilities. The premises closure of the data, the three in June are linked to the three blocks that were closed in the Graham Park Estate as part of the ongoing work on Operation Dakota. I will touch on Operation Dakota workload in the CSMAIC slide after this one because there is a relevancy following the last couple of weeks' outcomes. The fixed penalty notice data is self-explanatory. It's the number that have been issued, the number that have been paid, those that haven't been paid. I've sat in my inbox, awaiting to be referred to HB-LUB for prosecution. And then the community trigger application, again, just because the community trigger, which is now on our website, has been changed because the Home Office changed the title of the way it's been case reviewed, but for the benefit of this meeting and wider knowledge we've left it in as a community trigger. It was only one for that period, which is good, but by the same token of reassurance to you, just because it might not meet the threshold for community trigger does not mean that case does not get the same scrutiny and level of review as a community trigger because we do want to make sure that we don't fail the victim or reporting party in any way. Next slide, please, Ben. You will obviously see two community safety matter meetings dated at CASF because it's a six-weekly rotation and the July meeting was on the middle of July. I think it was the 9th of July for memory. The reason why I'd like to have a quick highlight on the number of cases coming in and them lowering is because we have been waiting for the Operation Dakota court outcomes cases to come to fruition. That date has been provided now, so whilst it may be low in this period and I'm expecting to see it at the next meeting to have risen, not considerably but have risen, and basically we have shut down quite a few cases that have naturally come to their conclusion and end point and they have been provided in some of the case studies for the end-of-year report and there will be some of the case studies that go in your mid-year report for the community safety team for tackling anti-social behaviour. Do you have any questions on those two slides, CASF? In that case, then I'll hand over to Declan for the CCTV. Thank you, Matt. Chair, these next couple of slides are just a brief overview of the CCTV because it is just a three-month picture of what we're seeing and it's really to give you some confidence around how the CCTV is working rather than delving into the granular figures that they're seeing because they're not particularly indicative of what's happening across the borough. So the first slide is, as you can see there, what we've done is we've split the reactive and proactive use of CCTV. So 87% of what the CCTV guys are doing in the control room is actually identifying stuff outside, which we didn't have that capability before we are now. Only 13% of it is reactive and that is stuff that they may be hearing on the police radios and are then focusing in or they're being asked to focus in on a particular location because something is taking place. So you can see there's a massive difference between that. It just shows how good the facility is there for identifying information. When you look at the actual figures, there was just under 1,900 incidents recorded by CCTV just in that three-month period. So an extremely useful tool and having had conversations with police colleagues, I think they're finding it extremely useful as well. Overall, it was 101 CCTV requests from insurance companies during that three months. So again, things like your road traffic accidents, et cetera, are being captured and there is footage so that can be dealt with. The next slide, thanks Ben. The next slide really, what we've done this time round is we've split all 24 wards down into the top 12 and the bottom 12 of incidents. Now, it's a little bit of a different picture because not every ward has got the same number of cameras. So you will obviously have recorded more in those wards that have got much more cameras. But if we go through some of the statistics, you'll see, so Collindale North, for instance, the figures, 231 for ASB, Beggin 24, Rough Sleepers 22 and others. So I've got others down there and this is just the individuals. When you look at the number there, 53, that is over a 12 week period. So they are just individual incidents. It could be a fraud incident that they've heard about on the radio and we'll focus in to see what they can see. It might be an accident. It could be a road traffic collision, something like that. And there's just very few of them. So if we were to put them all on this report, you'd have like 30 pages. So I've just put it down under other. With the rest of the boards, you know, you can see how it filters down and you can see what the primary offences are that are being spotted. So I know we've spoken previously about Beggin and you can see how that's filtering out across the borough and how we're actually capturing evidence of that on the on the footage. And of course, that gives us the ability to either speak to police or deal with the matter ourselves via the community safety team. And the other elements of it, fly tipping is very important because that's a key priority for the community safety team. And when they're captured, you know, again, the information is you'll have a vehicle and a registration number and description of a person. And that's then passed on to the team to investigate. And that will inevitably result in an enforcement activity of sample or prosecution. So we're getting much better at that. And the evidence is now helping us with all of that. So the next slide, I think it's just the second half of the ward, so the lower reports. Again, it's showing you the top elements of each ward. But as I said, in some of these wards, there is fewer cameras than in others. So you will get lower reports coming through. I mean, unless there's unless you've got any questions on that particular aspect of it, this is just an overview of how that's working. Thank you very much. I think I'd just add a couple of things. We've obviously started a fly tipping campaign as the council, sorry, working with the place team and enforcement together. And there's been the posters on bus stops and that sort of thing. So that's welcome. And, you know, it's a key issue for residents in particular wards, including my own. I think we'll also be doing a campaign around the PSPO, which will be very welcome as well to highlight awareness. I just wanted to note going backwards on the gun crime and the really significant decline in that we were on grand part yesterday, a team of us of police and council and talking to residents again, I don't think we can ever underestimate the difference that that operation has made. It's not perfect. There's always ongoing need, but the difference that has made for this borough in terms of where we were a year or so ago is quite extraordinary. And I also wanted to note on the robbery figures that have gone up that we'll be doing, I think it's both teams, family services and community safety, a specific violence reduction unit supported project starting very soon. So I don't know if anyone wants to mention that at all at this point. And yes, we'll keep an eye on the merit cases and just understand what's what's coming through that. I think Fiona, did you want to? No, not at all. And nice to see you, Declan. I just noticed that there's a number of instances that just has rough sleeping. Obviously that's not a crime and generally those individuals are incredibly vulnerable. So I wondered what does that prompt? Do your team then contact Streetlink? Do they contact outreach workers so that they can get access to support in a timely fashion? Yeah, thanks, Fiona. So the purpose of it on the CCTV slides is really that the CCTV operators are identifying where there is rough sleeping taking place that is then passed on. So we will always get a report every day. We get a report in community safety of basically these figures. And that will get passed on to our teams. They'll go out and they'll see who these people are. And we'll engage with the rough sleeping team as well. So they go out and then they can help these individuals. Does it also pick up people who are living in vehicles? It's a bit difficult for that because are they actually living it? Are they just waiting for somebody? I think when it gets reported to us as somebody living in vehicles, then the same process takes place. But whether it's picked up on a CCTV camera, it's a slightly different thing. Also, just to add that certainly from putting the CCTV in from the early figures and things, I was really encouraged by the number of welfare check calls that were also made with ambulances, et cetera, called for people in distress, which wasn't necessarily our priority when we put it in. It was very much on the policing and crime side. But that has always been a very welcome additional feature with this. I think if you're ready to move on, Chair, the next slide is pairing with prevent. Thank you. I think, as you can see, the most glaring figure six out there is a 53% increase, almost 53% increase, on the same period last year for Q1. The main reason for that is that Q1 of 22/23 was exceptionally low. We normally get around 30 referrals in a period, and it just happened that last year was quite low. Some of those that came in, what you might see, there's a 125% increase on mixed, unclear and unspecified. Those areas will be changed going forward. I think SO15 and the Home Office are trying to understand those referrals a bit more, so they're breaking down rather than the broader, other or mixed, unclear. They'll be breaking down to lots of different areas, so maybe next time I'll be reporting something a bit different. But some of the things, for example, that we did see rising this year came from those low-level antisemitism that very much were associated with the current conflict that's going on in the area at the moment, some odd ones with a young person bringing in an imitation firearm, someone calling for medieval law to be brought back. Also, we had someone referring to Elliott Rogers, who was an infamous multiple-killer, a multiple-school shooting. There's a lot of areas there, but if we look at the next page, the next slide, rather, which compares to national figures, what we see there are very, very similar to what the rest of the country are reporting. As always, we always report higher levels of young people being referred, because we are in a borough, in an area that we're fortunate enough to have a Preventive Education Officer up until April of this year, and I think schools are just a lot more aware. Just going forward, though, we have seen a tour – we've had a couple of referrals – that have been associated with the national riots, and these were quite other ways, really, that the people who have been identified just happened to be seen in the media by people who knew them, and they featured in papers, so quite public incidents, but they, going forward, you may see that rise as we understand all those referrals come forward. Thank you. Any questions? I would just like to note at this point that the Council, which you've been very involved with and the different teams, has been doing a review of our work on hate crime and community cohesion very much. We were going to be doing that anyway, because the strategy concludes this year, but to co-produce and have a dialogue with all of our communities, and there will be work coming up in Hate Crime Week and beyond to start a conversation and to very much highlight the strengths of this borough, as well as understanding the issues that are out there, so thank you. I can't see any questions online, either, and I'm also aware that some people online are in the room, too, which is a bit confusing as well. Hello, Chris. So I think that's it on these slides, then, and we'll move on to – sorry, Claire's about to tell me we need to note them, so we've noted the slides and thank everyone for their contribution and their work. That takes us on to, I think, the more detailed update, verbally, from the North West BCU police, if that's okay. Sorry, I think it's – yeah, it's okay, and I'm a bit confused with the mics as well today, so I think we're moving on, if you've got anything, verbally, to update at this point. Yeah, that's fine. Great. Okay, so we'll take that, and we've had your update within the slides. Thank you. That takes us on to Item 9. Before we start the family services update, I would like to thank a note for the whole team, the really good Ofsted review, including outstanding in one of the categories. We are really proud of the work that it's done and thank the team very much. Sorry, I'm having a bit of mic trouble. Okay, so you have the report, so I won't go through it in incredible detail, but just pick out some of the key highlights from the domestic – we'll start with the domestic abuse report. I'm sorry, I'm having some IT challenges this morning, so I'm flicking through paper. Please excuse the noise if it's making on the mic. So you'll see on page 4 that we are – we're halfway through most of our objectives in the domestic abuse and violence against women and girls strategy. We have about a quarter of our actions in progress, and then we have about 20 per cent where we are expecting them to start this year. So those actions are expected to be finalised by the end of March 2025, and that will coincide with the development of our new strategy for domestic abuse involved that we are starting consultation on now, which will run from 2025 to 2028. So, just in terms of the rates, we've just seen the police rates on the domestic abuse, but we are the fourth – we're showing us the fourth lowest rate in London in terms of reported domestic abuse incidents, but we're also showing us the third highest rate in London for positive outcome rates, which used to be known as the sanction and detection rates, so that's positive news for Barnet. We haven't – we've seen some fluctuations in domestic abuse referrals in terms of volume, but I'll come to that in a minute. We've been running some very successful children's groups and we've modified them, so these groups are for parents and for children, to help them overcome their experiences with domestic abuse, and hopefully, break cycles of future generational abuse, and they're delivered through our early help services. Training has continued throughout the quarter, it's still well attended, and we've got some feedback in the report about some of the people that have accessed some of our courses as well. Just on the IRIS program, I think it's important to note on the IRIS program, we still don't have sign-up from a group of GPs, and it's been three years now that we've not been able to engage those GPs in that sign-up. I suppose we have to – we're going to be doing a bit more analysis on whether or not we're still getting referrals from those GP surgeries, because I think that's what we don't know, so we can see the GPs, their surgeries and their volumes of referrals coming in. We have seen a reduction of, I think, it's 13% in quarter one of referrals from GPs, but that's kind of in line with the reduction in referrals for domestic abuse across the board, so we don't know if that's specific to GPs. But we are going to take a closer look at that for quarter two. The Victim and Prisoners Act 2024 received a Royal Assent in May 2024, and that now places a statutory responsibility on police forces to share information with schools about domestic abuse incidents – that's Operation Encompass – and we're working with schools and the police to make sure that that's implemented. As the chair, Councillor Conway, just noted, there's a note in here about the feedback from the Ofsted Inspection of Local Authority Children Services that we had in June, and they recognised that the MARIC was working well and that social work is in our Children and Family Services, understand the domestic abuse impact on children and that it's clearly articulated in assessments and that we're working as an organisation to help parents overcome their experiences of abuse. So, yeah, the MARIC referrals, we've seen a reduction of 30%, quite a significant reduction in MARIC referrals in quarter one. Actually, that's over the last 12 months, not quarter one. But again, it's synonymous with all the other reductions that we're seeing, and we're just interested to know why that's happening. Sixty-one percent of our MARIC referrals are around physical violence in the relationship, which is linked to the high-risk nature of the MARIC in any event. So we have prevention fund that's enabling us to deliver some training, and we've been doing workshops for practitioners and residents and partner organisations around hate crime involved. And there's a study in there about the work that was done with resources for autism and barnet men cap. We have 20 professionals and volunteers attend that. So that's positive and we'll continue rolling those out. There's some case studies in there from victims, and I think what they're doing is highlighting the courses that we are running for victims and survivors, that they're having an impact, that they're helping women feel safer and to develop confidence to hopefully not go in to stay safe from abusive relationships and hopefully not repeat those cycles of victimisation. So we've invited SOLIS because the reduction in referrals, and we've also seen a reduction in the uptake. So the number of women or victims that have referred to SOLIS for help and support, there's a larger percentage in this quarter of cases being declined, and we're curious about why that is. So we're inviting them to come to the quarter two, that will be reported in quarter two. They'll be coming to the next board to help us understand the rationale behind their decision making for referrals. Good to note that we've had a fourth Barnet Refuge open. It's been opened by the Iranian Kurdish Women's Rights Organisation, has eight bed spaces for single Middle Eastern, North African and Afghan women who are fleeing domestic abuse. So really positive to see that additional resource in the borough. And I think the one-stop shop, we're still seeing good multi-agency working through the one-stop shop, and we're still seeing good footfall through that service. We can see that the links to housing, the links to temporary accommodation, I think they're a bit of a challenge. I don't think we have housing colleagues here today, but that's a bit of a challenge because lots of women who are fleeing domestic abuse want to leave, want to stay in the local area, and we don't have properties in the area to enable them to stay. I feel like we should all stand up for something. So we're working with housing to have a look at how we can determine priority around those women and children that need to stay in the borough, and those that could move out of the borough. But we're also considering ideas around perpetrators leaving the property and making sure that they're the ones that are going to TA rather than children, causing more disruption. Okay, so the perpetrator programme, so the CIFA programme, we've only got funding until, it's been very successful in rolling that out across the other ten boroughs, really good partnership working there. Unfortunately, we don't have agreement for funding beyond March 2025 at this point, so it will be a shame to lose that provision. It's really making a difference, and every time we hear from perpetrators who are using the programme, they give such strong and positive feedback about the way that it's considering domestic abuse in a cultural context. So we hope after the autumn budget statement that we might get some news on potential funding for next year, but maybe I'm being optimistic. So you can see here in the report that the volume of domestic violence prevention notices and domestic violence prevention orders that have been granted, and the number of Claire's law disclosures and outcomes, and that's on a steady pace. As you know, we've launched the Safe Haven pilot in March, and we are now at the point of review, so that's been live for six months now, so we're having a review of how that's working, so we're linking with those three premises that have the Safe Haven tools and stickers to look at what impact that's having, whether people are aware of what it is, and whether people are using it, and whether there's a need for us to roll that out in certain premises across the rest of the borough. So that's happening now, that review. Any questions on domestic abuse involved before I move on to reducing offending? Sorry, if I could just say a couple of things. One is I think it would be really helpful for councillors to understand, with solace, and why certain things aren't being progressed. Sorry, I know myself, I refer residents there, so I think that would be really helpful to have some sort of communication back on that. In terms of the Safe Haven assessment, I think we agreed that we'd do that through the winter period, because we think that there might be more take-up starting to happen as it gets darker earlier. In terms of CIFA, the administration very strongly supports its continuation, and if there's any sort of letter or communication you need from the chair, I'm very happy to do that. And lastly, I would suggest maybe Barnet Homes, when they're next here, if they can give us an update on how the accreditation process is going. I think it would be helpful if we could note that. Yep, thank you very much. Does anyone have any questions or comments on this section? No? Okay, thank you. So, just on to reducing offendings. In similarity, the Youth Justice Plan also does feel like a good time to be updating strategies at the moment, so the Youth Justice Plan is, we've just produced our annual report for last year, that was taken to the Overview and Scrutiny Committee, and we are now working on developing our Youth Justice Plan for 2025 to 2026 or 7, and that will be in production, it will need to go to full council for sign-off next year, so we'll be working with partners to develop that. So we're in Year 2 of our current strategy and this report provides an update on quarter one. I mean, it's all pretty positive in as much as Barnet's first-time entry rates is lower than London and the national averages, reoffending rates are lower than London and the national averages, and our custody rates are also lower. So the Barnet Youth Offending Service is doing a pretty good job on supporting young people to stay out of the criminal justice system through their out-of-court disposals and prevention programmes, and also to make sure that when those young people are coming into the system, that we reduce the risk of recidivism for those young people. So, yeah, it's a pretty positive story. So, in the quarter one Youth Justice Management Board, we focused on tackling disproportionality. It's acknowledged that we have disproportionality in our Youth Justice cohort. You can see from the data that we've got on page 18, which is about the young people's arrest and disposal statistics, and overwhelmingly we see a larger proportion of young black males. The stop and search is starting to improve, those numbers are going down, but the arrest is still higher. What we don't understand is what happens at charge, so we can't see if there's disparity at the charging point, so we know that we have more young black people arrested, but do they get the same outcomes at the point of charging? So we've asked the Youth Justice Police to help us try and understand that picture a little bit clearer, but we can see through the report that they are more likely to be charged for an offence, and less likely to be handed down an out-of-court disposal, so we do know that, but what we can't see is the tariff of offending, so we can't see whether black boys are just being arrested for more serious crimes, and therefore are not appropriate for out-of-court disposals, so that's a further piece of work that the Youth Justice Board and partners will be completing. So we know already we've tackled, we've spent a lot of time as a partnership tackling exclusions of black boys from education, and we've been able to bring that number down, so we knew back in 2021 when we started this work that black boys were more than twice as likely to have an exclusion than white children in Barnet schools, and as a local authority, Barnet had a higher rate of exclusions of black boys than other boroughs in north London, so we've had a tackling disproportionality groups tackle that, and we've reduced that, so it feels more balanced now, although we're seeing different children now being subject to exclusion, so we're keeping an eye on those particular groups, and suspensions, and that's part of the work that Chris is doing with schools as well, to have a look at those young people who are being suspended but not permanently excluded. We're also focused on our young people who are not in education, employment and training, and when we looked at our cohort, we could see of our need, the not education, employment training cohort, 66% of them were male, and 58% of them were from black and other minority ethnic groups, so we've got disparity and disproportionality in that group as well, so we can see it right through the youth justice system. Similarly, transfers to probation, 80% of the boys, they were all boys that were transferred in the year to June 2024, 80% of them were from black and other minority backgrounds, and what we don't yet understand is at what point were they arrested and what charges they had, and what was the kind of trigger for transferring to probation, so we need to just understand some of that detail a little bit clearer. Just to let you know that we have a, there's a Pan London stop and search pilot, it was launched in Haringey as a pilot about a year or so ago, Haringey council worked with the police and they dip sampled groups of children who were subject to stop and search to identify vulnerabilities in that particular group. We don't ordinarily, hadn't ordinarily received police notifications for children that are subject to stop and search, and what that audit found was that the children, some of these children were children that were in care, that had additional vulnerabilities, and the systems around those children were not being informed about these incidents, which meant that support couldn't be given to those children, so together with the police and Haringey they've launched a campaign across London, so it's now a Pan London pilot, and Barnet alongside colleagues across London are going to be doing dip sample or dips on our own stop and search children, and feed into that wider piece of work, and hopefully that will create a national change. I do have a question about that, but, and also the proportionality of it, and as long as, I know you're looking at it from, in terms of ethnic background, race, are you also looking at it in the context of disability, so I'm thinking about diverse, neurodiversity and mental health? The Haringey findings showed that there was a disproportionate number of children with SCN, EHCP, so there are vulnerabilities in this cohort of children, but we also know that the children that are in the justice system are similarly, they're over represented if they've got EHCP, so social communication difficulties in particular, so yeah. So we'll let you know how that goes, so we're just starting that now, and that's being led by Di Dave La Riviere and Cezanne from our youth justice team, so they're representing us in that piece of work. Tina, can I suggest maybe they come to a future board meeting to present on that at an appropriate time, I think would be good, because that would follow on from the report that you did last year, so do you want to, yeah, go ahead Ray. Thanks Chair, I just wanted to ask Tina, because I know we've asked before about the numbers of autistic young people that you might be, the teams might be working with, and the issues they face, I mean that's something we're keen on, both from the safeguarding adult board's point of view and developing the autism strategy, and I was just wondering if somebody perhaps could come to the access to justice subgroup where we could go through that in more detail, I think it would be really helpful, we've got one in early December, and I suppose I'd be keen especially to be looking at the pathways we've got from either autistic people who are offending, autistic people who are victims of crime, and what pathways have we got to support another working well, because there's a lot of support out there, it's just making sure that those pathways are working effectively, so if we could get somebody down to the access to justice group in December that would be great, thanks. It might be something that our clinical, we've got a clinical psychologist in the team and she's working largely with that, so I'll, please send me the dates and I'll forward the invite to her, and if she can't come I'm sure somebody else from the team will. So we also had a look at our restorative justice and victims programmes, that's been working really, really well, so we're working with young people to help them make reparations for their crimes and make contact with victims and write letters of apology and or meet with victims to, so we're holding restorative conferencing, so we're having, interestingly, a number of victims don't want to engage in that process, but the young people are being encouraged to write those letters even if the victims don't want to receive them, so that they are thinking about the consequences of their actions and the impact that their crimes have on the victims, so that's been a positive piece of work. We've got lots of young people involved in community reparation and we've had five new sites set up in Quarter 1, so we've got Edgware, Library, Little Village, Second Chance, Chipping and Osage Libraries are now sites for our young people to get involved, and we're giving young people AQA certificates, so that's recognised as part of their achievements as well, which has been really positive. We've given 112 of AQA certificates in Quarter 1, so lots of certificates being given out. Okay, so there's some stuff around, some online materials that have been published, and there's a link for you to have a look at that, and we'll report in Quarter 2 on the Youth Justice Residential, another successful residential in Surrey, I think we were this time, but that was really positive, and we've been working with an Olympian, BMEXA, who's been delivering a programme in the borough, him and his brothers and his father run a company now, teaching track racing skills, and it's focused on black young boys. That's been really positively received, so we hope we can continue that partnership if we have available funding. So the last part is on the Integrated Offender Management and the Reducing Offending Delivery Group, so the IOM, the stats are all reported within the report. We've been looking at the transition for young people, recognising, and we were talking about this in this Youth Justice Matters Board that we just had yesterday, there's definitely a gap between young people coming out of the youth justice system and then something happens in those intervening years before they end up in IOM, where they're now persistent, violent, prolific offenders, so we don't know what's happening in that space for those young people because there's not many services connected to them post-18. So we're trying to understand how we can make that better for those young adults. So we can see that in Quarter 4, we didn't have the Quarter 1 data for this year, but in Quarter 4 we saw violence moving to the top of the offences for IOM, which had taken over from theft in Quarter 3, but as expected, drugs, weapons, robbery are all in those top five categories. Okay, so I think that's all from me on this one. Thank you. Any questions? Thank you very much. Are there any questions at all? Any further? No? Great, thank you. So that's for noting. And then we move on to Item 10, which is Update to Serious Violence Duty and Violence Reduction Plan, which Chris Kelly is going to take us through. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Again, I would refer my colleagues and yourself, Chair, to the report and also the Violence Reduction Plan that's contained within the documents. I thought it'd be helpful just to highlight some key achievements, really, and kind of key outputs that we've seen over the last quarter. So starting kind of on Page 5, under Governance, we continue to have a really strong partnership arrangements to join up, both strategically and also operationally as well. Very much it's evidenced through the various panels and also strategic groups in terms of TTCG, MACE, CS MARAC, and also problem-solving groups as well, which really seeks to establish a understanding of the presenting needs and themes that are emerging and then also around kind of the actions in terms of mitigating risk around violence and also exploitation as well. A regularly distributing information in terms of our key partners as well in a proportionate way, support awareness, raising kind of the outward focus in terms of our partners understanding the local issues within communities and things as well, and also then being really kind of clear in terms of how they can raise further concerns that either, for example, their schools or various groups and young people that are raising know where to report back to. In terms of analysis and enforcement, we have a range of obviously police-led operations to address kind of localised needs. Again, a lot of that is identified through the partnership and governance arrangements that we have around kind of strategic meetings and also operational meetings as well. We've obviously heard from MPS colleagues around some of the successes that they've had over the last quarter around the reduction of violence against the persons, which has seen an 11% decrease, and also in terms of a decrease of violence against persons with injury as well. We have seen during call to soup one, which has already been discussed and highlighted, an increase around kind of knife crime offences, but that is not in relation to injury, and we feel that that is really just a potential impact of the increased operations and presence that we have within the communities at the moment. So we are very kind of keen in terms of targeting kind of areas that we are aware of that are linked in relation to kind of violence and things, and one of the things that we are doing in relation to that is obviously then triangulating and galvanising our outreach programmes and also our My Ends project when it comes online and also the Safer Schools Robbery Safety Initiative as well. We will see kind of increased activity in call to two around Project HADR as well, which again is predominantly a police-led but is also a partnership initiative as well, which will look at kind of a holistic way in which drugs are being tackled and also the associated crimes as well, so that would be something that would be reported back on in terms of next quarter. In terms of reducing access to weapons, we continue to work with our Barnet Education and Learning Service to track excluded and suspended young people, certainly where there has been some indications around either kind of weapons carrying or violence within the context of schools as well, and really kind of one of the things that leads to is targeting around their Restorative Justice hub and coordinating them will go into the schools and try to work with them in relation to pulling around kind of restorative conversations with young people, and also that it then leads to additional development around training, workforce development and stuff like that as well. What we've seen around our Restorative Justice over the last quarter is that they've gone into four schools with a total of 102 participants that have been involved in training, and at the moment what's happened is that that has then resulted in them actually taking on kind of more of a restorative conversations between people, between staff members and also young people as well, and then looking at kind of some forms of mediation and restorative meetings in relation to that as well. In terms of our outreach and detached, so looking at the activity which is occurring around that, during quarter one we've had 67 sessions where we've had our outreach workers that have been targeting and being present within our communities. That's totaled 201 hours of delivery, and during that time we have reached 186 young people, and we're finding, similar to the previous year really, that the majority of engagement is with males, so that's around 56% certainly during quarter one, and that the primary age group that we appear to be engaging with and that are also receptive in relation to engagement is around that 12 to 15 age group as well, which we're quite positive around as it offers potential diversionary work, especially when you look at the strategic needs assessment and actually our higher range cohort in terms of violence and stuff tends to be class 18 as well, so we're hoping that it will lead to diversionary work in relation to that. Some of the themes that emerged from the outreach work obviously get reflected back in terms of the governance arrangements and the range of meetings that we have, so examples of that is around of course CS MARAC and strategic base, and one of the positives that have come out from that as well is that we have found an unusual and unexpected theme of young people actually expressing an interest to becoming peer mentors and also becoming outreach workers themselves, which has been really, really good. So what we are really excited about is that that dovetails really beautifully into our Mayans projects, which will be coming online certainly in quarter two, which will then look at developing peer mentors and also kind of helping expand the outreach program as well, so we will have some continuity around the delivery of that over the course of the next year. Is that the project with Arts Against Knives as well? It is indeed, yeah. So I think coming from a background in the youth sector that that is really, really welcome in terms of young people being able to step forward and encourage others is fantastic, thanks. I just wanted to check it was that project, thank you. So the other part, just to link to that as well, is that our after school safety initiative projects, which is looking at tackling kind of localised robberies, certainly within our transport hubs, we have started to mobilise and come online in relation to that during quarter one through our partnership with NPS. So that has been through the marking of mobile phones, we've begun to get in contact and be present within our schools as well, and also to raise awareness around that. And we've just appointed the two workers that will then be mobilised to actually be providing the community safety aspect and then also around the outreach aspect within our transport hubs, and it's expected they will start in quarter two. So working with our communities, we continue to deliver around our contextual training. So that is both to our VCS partners, grassroots organisations, as well as partners as well, and that we also continue to have a substantial and comprehensive wraparound in terms of when serious incidents do occur. So what we are able to do is look at attending and facilitating a range of community impact meetings where there have been incidents of violence, and to then be looking at coordinating the input through our violent integrated clinical service, and then also any other support charities, businesses that can potentially help support around the collective and individual kind of trauma and emotional impact around that. In terms of building on the victim's care hub, quarter one had seen a total of 54 referrals, which is forecast to be well over what we had intended to deliver, and clearly there is a significant demand in relation to the victim's care hub. We're seeing that the type of referrals are really coming from a range of different partners, but children and young people services, of course, community safety, police, and we're really focused at the moment on promoting greater awareness around the victim's care hub in terms of housing colleagues as well, and that's because there's been a range of coordinating meetings over quarter one, which has kind of indicated vulnerability of housing tenants, which has then resulted in coordinated activity, and we want to make sure that there is a comprehensive support there for the victim as well. Just I made a referral myself last week, and that was something I was fortunate to go on a ride along with the police response team, and so I think it would be helpful to join up there, actually, for some of those cases to increase awareness of the support hub, because it proved very useful, and it was very useful to be able to offer that support. Thank you, Councillor. I'll make sure that it's prioritised. Thank you, and also, you know, thanks to the team, both on restorative justice and the victim support hub, who responded incredibly quickly to that. Thank you. In terms of kind of the nature of the referrals, we find that the majority of referrals are around crime prevention, in terms of kind of general things, and then the next area which we are seeing quite significant demand on is in relation to victims of common assault and also knife crime as well, and then around exploitation, so specifically around criminal exploitation. We see, in terms of the breakdown around those 54 referrals, 34 of those were adults, 24 of those were children, and again, we're seeing more males that are engaging in the context of that service and stuff as well, so 32 males which we were working with in terms of victims. And I'll hold there for any questions from colleagues. I guess just an observation for me, I know the duty kind of goes up to 25 in terms of interventions. I noticed that a lot of the kind of outreach work, diversionary work, kind of stopped at 18, and just in the kind of language, it's around kind of young people. I'm kind of wondering what focus we have as an authority around young adults and those 18 to 25s, particularly around, you talked a lot about the kind of educational piece, how far are we into FE colleges and to some degree, some universities where people are coming in with that kind of serious violence piece post 18. So in terms of restorative justice, we have begun to work with Middlesex University and that we do have existing links in terms of Barnett and Southgate as well. What I was going to say, with the outreach side of things, it's really interesting because the project is actually scoped to be working with also and engaging with young adults up to the age 25 as well, and we continue to try and engage with our plus 18 cohorts when out and about. And there is a reluctance in relation to that, however, the workers are continuing and they are absolutely aware that they need to continue to try and engage in terms of that age group. So I guess how do we, from a probation service, we're dealing with those adults, how do we engage in that process and ensure that our young people know that these services exist locally? Sorry, could you repeat that just a second? That's okay. So from a probation perspective, where we're often working with these young people as both perpetrators and victims, how do we ensure that we can promote the accessibility to those services locally? So I think that it's around making sure that there's an awareness within probation in terms of what services and local services are around. What we can do is that there is kind of a community directory which has been pulled around as part of the needs assessment for the serious violence duty as well, which outlines a range of kind of youth provisions that were focused around supporting young people, around awareness of weapons and violence and things as well. That can absolutely be shared and I can ping the crossover to your workers and things as well. The other thing as well with that is that we also try to ensure that kind of the adults risk panel is coordinating some of that activity for also those young adults and things that we're worried about in terms of violence as well. And my final question Chris, sorry to be pleased to know, will the kind of intervention such as that kind of peer mentoring that you've talked about be available to that 80s/25 cohort as well? So we are really kind of focused in terms of looking at trying to expand on universal offers around mentoring for that older age group. At the moment there is a bit of a gap as kind of highlighted by Tina around the IOM cohort as well, post 18 to them becoming a little bit older and that's something that we're really focused on in terms of looking at what potential opportunities there are in terms of funding and projects and around also how we can effectively engage and help continue to promote different trajectories for that group as well. Thank you and it does sound like an area for future work for co-production with young people as well and I can see Tina's got a hand up and there might be more we want to pick up in the private bit of the meeting as well, thank you. I'm just thinking Karim that when we get information about London Crime Prevention Fund because the ex-offender mentoring service that we have that's attached to the IOM that's funded through the London Crime Prevention Fund and we haven't yet, correct me if I'm wrong Matt, we haven't yet had any requests, we haven't been given the amount that we've got available to us for the next three years yet and all of that funding is part of that funding suite that runs out in March 25, but when and if we get an invitation to set out what we'd like to deliver over the next three years we could certainly, I think because we know that we've got this gap that we could extend that programme to younger probation cohorts, so young adult cohort that's open to probation, not just specifically IOM. Yeah because IOM is only 25% of the young people on IOM and they are a specific group of individuals that actually get a lot of support in other areas anyway, but I'm thinking more broadly about the generic caseload as you've highlighted and we do have loads of young adults on our caseload that are not IOM. I think it's something we definitely need to look closer into together and with certain local partners as well. I think Matt wants to say something, thanks. Yeah, chair, unfortunately we received apologies from Alice Bird from MOPAC for this meeting, the two items that I was hoping Alice could give us an update on, I've chased it in the background via email, is number one, Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London is currently out to local authorities consulting on the police and crime plan that has to be published by the 31st of March of next year, 2025, in previous funding streams for the local crime prevention fund, which is the sole money that is being referred to in this matter, we were given quite short notice for submission of bids, which Chris and I completed, so what I've asked is, number one, could we try if possible please and have some kind of earlier prior notice so we can bring it to elected members and colleagues to determine what we would like to propose to use that funding for and two, could you try and indicate as best as you can, allowing for the current circumstances nationally, what that funding, grant funding offer is likely to be and what you would wish for, excuse me, London and specifically Barnet local authorities to seek to invest in and what would be your running time for that. The problem that we have with grant funding, especially from grant funding streams such as MOPAC is, it's often decided in quite short notice for those agencies or those services to then make that grant submission, so we can plan but we can't predict and that is a vulnerability for us from the work streams that we're doing already. Having said that, we've put that representation in, I've asked Alice via email yesterday, okay you can't come, could you please try and give us some kind of indication and I'll carry that on as a piece in the background and obviously brief, Claire and Dec according. Very much so, I'd also like to note just how well the relationship between the different departments in the council is working, particularly the two of you and the bids that have come through this year, I'm aware that it's a healthy challenge that we all give ourselves in the way things are constructed in Barnet and I think it's very welcome. I also have squibbled a note myself on the MOPAC issue, I'm very happy to take that up, we're very happy to take that up as an administration and if there's any appropriate meetings, letters etc, we can have a chat afterwards about that, thank you. I didn't have anything else to add, Councillor. Thank you very much, that was really detailed and obviously a very important area of work for everybody and thank you for the questions as well, so we note that and we move on to item 11 which is the hate crime update, thank you. Thank you very much. I hope you've always had an opportunity to read the report, I'm sure you're very aware of what's been happening nationally with the riots, all of which mostly was driven by fake news, misinformation. We've seen a rise of over 200% in anti-Semitism in Barnet alone since the October conflict that began last year and one third of all anti-Semitism across London happens in Barnet as well, so we've got together things, there's a focus, we need to be focusing on community cohesion. One of those areas I think is tackling hate crimes, so together with Councillor Conway, the comms team, myself, lots of different areas across the local authority, we've been looking at how can we in some way drive or tackle hate crime. This report really just brings together what we're doing currently and this is just the start, there's lots of things happening in the future, we've got the Hate Crime Awareness Week coming up in October, there is a comms campaign will be starting right on the back of that, we also have a Hate Crime Summit that is also planned for early October and really I just want to highlight some of the areas in here, some of the things we're doing at the moment across the local authority, the community safety team, one of the priorities is access to justice for people who are victims of hate crime really just to ensure that people feel comfortable and confident in reporting their hate crimes. Myself, the hate crime lead obviously and I do a lot of work with schools, early intervention, classroom settings, bullying, discrimination, resilience about hatred, online we have lots of funding come from the SCF now, lots of the shared endeavour funding which has seen a lot of organisations and I hope at the next meeting I have some outcomes of those deliveries, many of that, much of that, in fact not all of it, is happening within schools looking at anti-discrimination, hate crime, online resilience, critical thinking, that kind of thing, the task and finish group I think I've just mentioned and we will have a bit more information on that comms update I believe a bit later on, we've got someone from comms going to give a bit more detail about that summit and the campaign. We have the Hate Crime Awareness Campaign at the beginning, the Community Capacity Project that has just finished, I'm hoping to have some outcomes from that as well, obviously we have Ray representing, Mencap here as well with the Zero Tolerance to Hate Crime Projects and I think you might be given a quick update when I finish this, is that ok? I know we've got a great opportunity there now, Fayez is doing absolute wonders at Mencap there. We have the Family Services as well, the Resources Toolkit that Tina shared with us at an earlier meeting that I've been sharing with schools and other professionals, etc, etc. With our partners, the police as well, there's a lot of focus I think on some of those events that are tied to the Palestine and Israel conflict as well, Michael Buckley as well, we've been very much engaged with local authority, with Ray, with Fayez, with the comms team really so we can just work together to drive and tackle this head on. There's a Why Me campaign video, there's a new video for immigrants or unaccompanied young people, it's just been launched as well, 22 local authorities have come together to put that together, one of those videos focuses on, in over 100 languages, focuses on the justice system as well, so we're hoping that people have the confidence to come forward, report more so we can understand a lot more. The Safer Spaces Scheme as well, again another thing that has been driven by the community, the zero project, zero tolerance to hate crime projects, and really just going forward, this is not where it stops, this is where it starts, anyone who has any thoughts or comments or suggestions of how we can improve reporting more than anything else, we know that hate crime isn't one of the massively unreported crimes, any way we can ease that, we're looking at maybe expanding the reporting centres, a couple of mosques I think are interested in opening or at least developing some hate crime reporting there, I do believe I think Islamophobia, I mean Barney is very much underreported as well, so anyone, we're always open to suggestions, ideas, input, engagement, anything that can help us improve. Yes? It's not an idea that came from me, but we ran a focus group with our sleepers a couple of weeks ago, and they commented that in response to the Southport incident that led to a large rise across everyone, including in Barnet, in potential risks, everything closed and they were left really very vulnerable with nowhere to go, and asked that in future if you're doing emergency planning, that actually those who are sleeping in our borough feature into that, because they felt very vulnerable, left without any access to services, so I said I'd raise it here. Okay, so what group was that in particular? That's individuals who are sleeping rough in the borough. Okay, homeless, yes, very good point, very good point as well, and I think to be aware as well, we do have five hotels in Barnet that are housing asylum seekers, and much of the rights happening around the country, I mean, I say isolated, there were isolated incidents last year on a much smaller scale where people turned up in the hundreds, you know, angry, and because of fake news, you know, they're living five-star lifestyles while we are freezing or living on the streets, so yes, certainly homeless people, thank you. Fiona, I think if you could put that in writing as well, that would be really helpful, because what we're trying to do collectively is to start a conversation with all communities on this, so that the summit that's been proposed by officers that we're bringing together covers a range of different people coming to that first meeting, there will also be an opportunity for a discussion online, and the whole idea is that we start this conversation this October to co-produce with our communities where we go on this together. What has come very strongly as well, because my portfolio covers, and we deliberately constructed it like this, community safety and resident participation, so there's been a whole programme of round tables that we've been doing anyway through the year, as well as the leader listens, etc., and so there's a very keen sense from local communities, not that we just don't just look at hate crime, but that we look at community cohesion and we actually celebrate, highlight, extend the initiatives that run anyway across our borough, and I think I will always be this balancing voice, but I think the response in Finchley from meeting with the local communities, from the fact that it was possible for the multi-faith forum to go in collectively and address Friday prayers, all of the informal outreach that's happened, the support for asylum seekers locally, etc., we're not complacent, but it has been extraordinary and very encouraging alongside the very difficult figures and time that it has been for communities in this borough. I will do that, I will set out, because actually the people we spoke with were very complimentary about other aspects of support as well that they do see and can access, it was just that specific gap, and they understood, they understood why libraries closed, why everyone closed, because of safety issues, it's just they wanted to ensure that in future, so no, I'll do a summary of that whole discussion actually and fold it onto you so you can include that in the future. That would be really helpful, because there's obviously homeless action in various people and places, okay, came to mind as somewhere that we could do separate listening and discussions with. I'm also conscious that the police after that whole operation sent us all as partners, what do you think was missing, what could we do differently, I think we all operate a learning by doing approach as well, and are always interested in knowing what is and isn't working, which is part of this as well, is to look at how we kind of review things, keep things different, work with communities going forward, so thank you. I wanted to give a specific update really on the zero tolerance to hate crime part of things, because we have had a problem over the last year in that we did have a vacant pulse for about six months, so that did impact on the project. What we've done now is we've filled it, we've filled it temporarily, now we've just filled it permanently and someone's about to start. Where I'd say it's caused particular problems is that it meant we haven't had the programme of training and workshops, and there's been less support for the hate crime reporting census, and that's certainly I'd say impacted on the number of reports, so that's one of the things that we need to catch up on now, we've got people backing the post, and I'd say the census especially we use in the hate crime week as a way to kind of reinvigorate them. I think there's things they can do during the week that would promote themselves both to their own staff and to other users as well, so it has been a difficult period, and we do appreciate itself as being a time when hate crime has been very much to the fore, but we're ready to catch up now. Thank you. That's very welcome to hear because part of it is to refresh what was there before in terms of the hate champions network and newsletter and all of that kind of thing. I think a lot of people stand ready to help and to be part of something very positive locally, so that's great. I think I now need to read out, I don't need to read out the whole thing, thanks, that's a great relief to everybody, so we're just noting the recommendations and thanking everybody. That takes us on to item 12 which is the combatting drugs partnership update. I would note that in this area we try to work very closely together, we also operate learning by doing. I think the addition of Project Adda to the borough this year is making a really welcome contribution as well. Are we starting with Councilor Moore? I don't mind, but thank you both for being here, and Louisa as well who I think is online and we wish you well. Thanks. Thank you Chair. I will just introduce Louisa who will present the report and to highlight it is an annual report, an update, but also presenting the new structure of the combatting drugs partnership board for your information and noting how we'll continue working. And I'll hand over to Louisa, I hope she's feeling better today. Thank you very much Louisa and for joining us despite not being well which is really appreciated. I think the new structure is very welcome because I know when we've been at meetings it has often felt like there isn't enough time to discuss in depth certain things. I think one thing I would add is Operation Woodson which has been underway this year in Buntoke and the very close working relationship and cooperation between the police, community safety, youth outreach and Change Grow Live with very clear offer of support as well as enforcement going on there which I think is really appreciated by everyone and actually has had several conversations with communities locally about that as well so I think it's a wider education piece that happens. I think Councilor Moore would like to add something as well, thank you. I just wanted to firstly start by thanking all the officers both within the council and actually across partners because while we haven't had absolutely consistent presence at our board meetings, actually we really have done quite well compared with some of our other borough authorities in terms of getting partners around the table and it spans right the way across council departments such as public health and children's and family services. Housing very importantly have been engaging but the reality is that they're formal meetings and the real meat of the work goes on through those relationships that are built outside those formal meetings so I absolutely do support the reduction of the formal meetings to two a year. I was very clear though that they needed to be aligned with the schedules of dates for Health and Wellbeing Board and Safe Community Partnership Board because this is the public and transparent reporting of that work that we are able to report in public and it's also really important that timing gives input to strategic decision making by those two boards as well. So I support it but I want to make sure that that's aligned and also enjoy partners to really pick up the baton in terms of leading on that work. You've talked around the table today about some really good working across departments within and beyond the council, across police, with probation and a range of others and so I think it's another case where it's very much more than the sum of the parts and so it's about making use of the resources, sometimes scarce that we have, making sure it's targeted into the right place to get the very best for our local residents, particularly those who are struggling to get their lives back on track. Thanks very much. I should note also I bumped into Change Grow Live yesterday as well while I was out and about and spoke to them about working with us possibly as volunteers with a listening session around the development of the VORG and DA strategy that actually came from them and a chat and an offer so I was going to bring that up too. I think Claire's got something you'd like to add, thank you. Thank you Chair. Thanks, it's really good to see an update on how the partnership is working and all of the results. I know various colleagues around the table are involved in. With regards to the new structure, I think it looks like a really good structure going forward. I'd just like to add that we probably need to add in the overview and scrutiny on the top level of that chart because we have Crime and Disorder overview and scrutiny annually in the summer and last year Louisa did attend with an update from the Combat and Drugs Partnership so in terms of absolute oversight it would kind of feed into that, that sits across health and wellbeing board and to the Community Safety Partnership. It's a challenge I think, that's obviously very sensible. Thank you very much. I know we all sit in a lot of meetings but there is a really strong collaborative approach here across partners and all officers and it's really very welcome. Councillor Warren? If I might just, I should have said it when I was thanking officers, actually just a recognition that some of the work has been presented at Pan London and wider bodies as well so there is broader recognition of some of the work that's going on, particularly with young people. Great, thank you. So we note that as in the report and then we move on to our final item which is safety in parts. I would like to note two things here just before I hand over to Cassie. One is that this actually came from a comment originally from Overview and Scrutiny Committee who were wanting to see some, I think they were looking at they were going to do some stuff on parts but actually it worked with work we wanted to do so that link is really important and the dialogue with all councillors and I'd also like to thank my colleague Councillor Schneiderman for his work and his input on this because a cabinet system enables us to work very collaboratively as a team as well so that's really appreciated too. Thank you Cassie. Thank you Cassie. I think also to pick up on what you said about the volunteering groups and the incredible way in which residents sort of are active in our green spaces. I think often when I'm asked what do you mean by resident participation, it's very much how residents choose to engage and I think some of the way people feel safer certainly from having been on sort of some of the Friends litter picks and all of that sort of stuff in Burntoke and wider is because they're going together and there's a sense of community that you know something that starts as a litter pick transforms into something completely different with the connections locally which is really wonderful to see and I think there's been such a growth in that in the past few years in the borough. I've not been to the green spaces forum actually for a while so if it's helpful to sort of go to that, that was a meeting I used to go to quite a bit so if you'd like me to go okay in this sort of role that would be great. I don't know if anyone's got any questions or comments. Lots here, go ahead. Thanks chair, thanks Cassie. It's been a really detailed piece of work so thanks very much for coordinating it and everybody that's been involved. The one thing I just wasn't sure which I just wanted to check for clarity really which isn't included in the report necessarily or the recommendations but we have spoken about it previously was around where we've got venues in parks such as cafes etc etc just looking at what the leases or contracts that we have so if for example they you know the operating hours whether there's antisocial behaviour or any safety concerns linked with a venue what kind of conditions we have and I know that you said that would be a wider review I just didn't want to lose it in this piece of work. Thank you, I think that would be great because also once I understand what you're saying and I've had conversations myself with the estates team at points it's also very much about protecting the people that are taking those leases on as well so it's not just a prohibitive thing it's there to try and keep everybody safer and I think in certain situations would be very welcome. Declan. Thank you chair, just very quickly to mention that one of the big issues that we had and we were trying to work through was the public's perception of safety in the parks because it doesn't necessarily mean that parks are unsafe it's just that they feel unsafe or look unsafe and that's what the feel is. As you know we're working on patrols etc which will help with that high visibility presence we've got a couple of high visibility vans coming on board within the next couple of weeks yes that's right and that's coming away that will obviously feed into the results of what's going on and we'll keep Tabs and keep Cassie involved with that and how we're doing that and just to add that our police colleagues are also involved with the parks because they use our PSPO tickets as well so they're out there and this is all hopefully going to add to the perception of the parks being a much safer place. I think I'll just add as well that the reason we brought in a PSPO across the borough and the provisions there was very much from listening to residents on doorsteps across the borough and in the parks too so it's you know it's something that was developed very much with an item to all of that. I'm sure we'll be hearing more about the vehicles that are coming soon to our parks I know that's been a very long-term project by the council as well thank you very much Cassie to you Matt and all the team for your work on this thank you so we note that report. The forward work programme I don't know if anybody's got anything oh sorry Fiona just the safeguarding adults board annual review will need to be probably at the next meeting if that's at all possible just because then I'll be able to present it that's November the 29th yep could you send us an email just so we pick that up yeah thank you that's great does anyone have any other business of course wow I'll just switch the mic two very quickly things of this too but I will be really brief what both good news I think first one initially when I started back in 2017 the police raised concerns that there wasn't a tiny appropriate adult service for adults obviously children and families pay for and support young people who are brought into custody but there's no legal requirement for anybody to do that for adults. MOPAC have finally agreed to fund it and it will start in January 2025 Ray and I are meeting with the lead to look at KPIs and what could be reported to locally around the impact and how that's working so hopefully that'd be really welcome news to your custody officers it's definitely welcome news for our client base because they're brought into custody they should get more timely support the other bit of news I thought I'm sorry I'm stealing your Thundergreen but I think it's I've heard some very good things about the SDS 40 release earlier this month I have and I thought it might be oh so the prison release that happened earlier and I thought so I just wondered if we could have I know that the London they're looking at are there lessons to be learned and to because obviously there's another release in October but generally I wondered if we could have the highlights to the next meeting or something thank you very much so that both welcome bits of good news of course we will be talking in the private bit of the meeting about how that first face has gone and lessons done because it's something we're keeping a very close eye on so I think that would need to be a discussion as to what it's possible to bring to the next meeting what it is and and other routes for sharing that but thank you for raising that that's great so the next meeting is on the 29th of September so November we're in September so right it's certainly very busy and we'll see everybody then and thank you all very much for the contributions and thank you to everyone online thank you thank you you you [ Silence ]

Transcript

Hello, good morning, welcome. I'm Councillor Sara Conway, Chair of the Safer Communities Partnership Board. Thank you for attending our meeting this morning, both in the room and online. Please note that meetings may be recorded and broadcast by people present as allowed for in-law or by the Council. Can I please remind the board to use the microphone when speaking by pressing the middle speaker icon. Press once to turn it on and once to turn it off. We ask that you remain seated throughout the meeting unless you are called to the table to address the board. I don't think we need everyone to introduce themselves. I do know that my colleague, Councillor Moore, is here, who chairs the Combat and Drugs Partnership Board, and that is so that we can join up the work that the Council is doing on key statutory requirements and generally on community safety. Apologies for absence, I think it's Greg from Barnet Homes, and I think Corinne is going to join us a bit later. Minutes of the previous meeting, does everyone agree with the minutes? Yep, nodding on line two, thank you, so they're agreed. Do any members have any interest to disclose today? Nope, that's great. Public questions and comments, we don't have any. Matters arising, does anybody have anything they need to raise at this point? Nope. So we'll start with the performance update, quarter one, which I think is Declan and Matt and the police as well. I'd like to start, as I often do, by thanking everybody from all the teams for all the work they've been doing in the past quarter. I know it has been difficult, challenging, et cetera, but everybody has done their very best through some particularly difficult situations in the summer, which I also notice the remarkable way our communities have responded to coming together to the, not threat, the difficulties Barnet found itself in. Thank you. Good morning, Councillor, good morning, attendees. The performance dashboard is on the screen behind you, Lieutenant and Councillor Moore. I possibly invite you to rotate your chairs so you don't get a crip neck or you can follow it on your laptops. Just a reminder, next slide, please, Ben. Just a reminder of where the data is sourced from. All of the crime data is taken from the London data website for our monthly crime data dashboard collation and the slides that relate to Barnet Council's assurance group community safety team functions is taken from the community safety team's internal data sources. Next slide, please, Ben. The ranking is self-explanatory. However, for people who haven't visited this meeting before, the ranking structure above is indicative of where we are placed by comparison to our either London colleagues for other boroughs or in relation to our tribe borough colleagues, and our tribe borough being Brent and Harrow. Ben, next slide, please. The next set of slides are actually police performance data. Therefore, chair, with your permission, I'll hand off to my police colleague. Good morning, everyone. I hope you can hear me okay. So I'm going to go over the Berkeley figures in the last three months from April to June, 400 cases of residential Berkeley in Barnet. The previous three months we showed a downward trend of 16 out of the 32 boroughs, but we now have an emerging issue. We're up 22 out of the 32 boroughs. In comparison with the three months last year, we were one out of the three boroughs across the north-west, and that is obviously rising. So from that, there is an increase from 371 burglaries that's gone up to 400, which is up 7.8%. However, the year-to-date figures, the burglary has gone down for the year-to-date figures for that. I'll move on to burglary business and community. Three months from April to June, there were 120 cases of non-residential burglary. We were sitting 13th out of the 32 B.C.U.s. We are now 6th out of the 32, so we have an improving figure for that, and it's a downward trend we're showing. The comparison from the three months previously was that we were in the middle of the three boroughs on north-west, and we're still there, and that hasn't changed. For the non-residential burglaries, we were sitting at 159, and now we're down to 120. That's down 24.5%, but there's no year-to-date figures. It hasn't shown any increase or decrease. We're just static for that. I'll move on to robbery next. Our robbery figures are showing 161 cases of robbery of personal property in Barnet. That was previously nine out of the 32 B.C.U.s, and now we're showing 11. It's an emerging issue for the robbery, and against our other boroughs in north-west, again, we are sitting middle of the road for that. For robbery, it was 166. Previously, we are now 161, so it's down 3%, but overall, the year-to-date figures, we are up slightly with a 5.5% increase in robbery. If we go to violence with injury, three months today, it was 475 cases of violence with injury in Barnet. We were three out of the 32 boroughs, now down to the second-best within the Met, and we're also the best within the actual B.C.U. itself. For violence with injury, we were 572 previously. We are now shown as 475. That is down 17%, and also our year-to-date figures is down 6.8% for our violence with injury. The knife crime with injury, there's 19 cases of knife crime recorded in Barnet. We were six out of the 32 boroughs, now down to the fifth, best in the Met for improving figures, and we are also the best within the B.C.U. itself. For knife crime with injury, it was sitting at 22, and we are down to 19 cases. That's down 13.6%. However, we have got year-to-date figures. We're still up 18.6, but we are looking for that downward trend, which is really positive. Then moving on to our lethal-barrel discharges. There was one case of lethal-barrel discharge in Barnet. Previously, that was 21 of the 32 boroughs. We are now improving on that. We are down to the 12th best within the Met, and we are again the second within the B.C.U. itself. For lethal-barrel discharges, there were three cases previously in the period, and we are now down to one, so that's a 66.7% decrease. The year-to-date figures were also down 84.6% for lethal-barrel discharges. For domestic abuse, there were 146 cases of domestic abuse in Barnet. Of the three months, we were the third out of the Met, and we've actually improved on that number. We're down to the second best in the Met, and also the best within the B.C.U. itself. Previously, there were 178 cases. We are now down to 146 of domestic abuse cases. That's down 18%, and our year-to-date figures are also down 46%. I think I will hand it over to Declan now. Is that right, or Matt? It's my turn again. Thank you very much, Chair. If you are happy, I will proceed now with the anti-social behaviour data for the Borough. As you can see, colleagues, from the slides, the top left is the use of our tools and powers. The top right is fixed penalty notices, where we're tackling anti-social behaviour in the form of environmental crime, and in the bottom right is the community's trigger data. If I could just touch on a few headlines, it's quite obvious there are some uses of tools and powers that have not been used. That's not uncommon. It does depend upon where cases are and who is the lead agency for that case. However, in the current data, what is obvious is the use of the Public Spaces Protection Order has jumped in May, and middle point in June of May's figure, thereabouts. But the reason for that jump is the Community Safety Team annually do a co-operative piece with our Parks colleagues, and we carry out intensive enforcement with the Neighbour Police and Team and the Community Safety Team. We do it through the week, Councillor, but we also have an enhanced focus at the weekends and on Friday evenings. A lot of those offences, without going too granular for you, are linked to set open spaces where people misuse barbecues or park in such a way that they cause obstructions for other people to be able to use those facilities. The premises closure of the data, the three in June are linked to the three blocks that were closed in the Graham Park Estate as part of the ongoing work on Operation Dakota. I will touch on Operation Dakota workload in the CSMAIC slide after this one because there is a relevancy following the last couple of weeks' outcomes. The fixed penalty notice data is self-explanatory. It's the number that have been issued, the number that have been paid, those that haven't been paid. I've sat in my inbox, awaiting to be referred to HB-LUB for prosecution. And then the community trigger application, again, just because the community trigger, which is now on our website, has been changed because the Home Office changed the title of the way it's been case reviewed, but for the benefit of this meeting and wider knowledge we've left it in as a community trigger. It was only one for that period, which is good, but by the same token of reassurance to you, just because it might not meet the threshold for community trigger does not mean that case does not get the same scrutiny and level of review as a community trigger because we do want to make sure that we don't fail the victim or reporting party in any way. Next slide, please, Ben. You will obviously see two community safety matter meetings dated at CASF because it's a six-weekly rotation and the July meeting was on the middle of July. I think it was the 9th of July for memory. The reason why I'd like to have a quick highlight on the number of cases coming in and them lowering is because we have been waiting for the Operation Dakota court outcomes cases to come to fruition. That date has been provided now, so whilst it may be low in this period and I'm expecting to see it at the next meeting to have risen, not considerably but have risen, and basically we have shut down quite a few cases that have naturally come to their conclusion and end point and they have been provided in some of the case studies for the end-of-year report and there will be some of the case studies that go in your mid-year report for the community safety team for tackling anti-social behaviour. Do you have any questions on those two slides, CASF? In that case, then I'll hand over to Declan for the CCTV. Thank you, Matt. Chair, these next couple of slides are just a brief overview of the CCTV because it is just a three-month picture of what we're seeing and it's really to give you some confidence around how the CCTV is working rather than delving into the granular figures that they're seeing because they're not particularly indicative of what's happening across the borough. So the first slide is, as you can see there, what we've done is we've split the reactive and proactive use of CCTV. So 87% of what the CCTV guys are doing in the control room is actually identifying stuff outside, which we didn't have that capability before we are now. Only 13% of it is reactive and that is stuff that they may be hearing on the police radios and are then focusing in or they're being asked to focus in on a particular location because something is taking place. So you can see there's a massive difference between that. It just shows how good the facility is there for identifying information. When you look at the actual figures, there was just under 1,900 incidents recorded by CCTV just in that three-month period. So an extremely useful tool and having had conversations with police colleagues, I think they're finding it extremely useful as well. Overall, it was 101 CCTV requests from insurance companies during that three months. So again, things like your road traffic accidents, et cetera, are being captured and there is footage so that can be dealt with. The next slide, thanks Ben. The next slide really, what we've done this time round is we've split all 24 wards down into the top 12 and the bottom 12 of incidents. Now, it's a little bit of a different picture because not every ward has got the same number of cameras. So you will obviously have recorded more in those wards that have got much more cameras. But if we go through some of the statistics, you'll see, so Collindale North, for instance, the figures, 231 for ASB, Beggin 24, Rough Sleepers 22 and others. So I've got others down there and this is just the individuals. When you look at the number there, 53, that is over a 12 week period. So they are just individual incidents. It could be a fraud incident that they've heard about on the radio and we'll focus in to see what they can see. It might be an accident. It could be a road traffic collision, something like that. And there's just very few of them. So if we were to put them all on this report, you'd have like 30 pages. So I've just put it down under other. With the rest of the boards, you know, you can see how it filters down and you can see what the primary offences are that are being spotted. So I know we've spoken previously about Beggin and you can see how that's filtering out across the borough and how we're actually capturing evidence of that on the on the footage. And of course, that gives us the ability to either speak to police or deal with the matter ourselves via the community safety team. And the other elements of it, fly tipping is very important because that's a key priority for the community safety team. And when they're captured, you know, again, the information is you'll have a vehicle and a registration number and description of a person. And that's then passed on to the team to investigate. And that will inevitably result in an enforcement activity of sample or prosecution. So we're getting much better at that. And the evidence is now helping us with all of that. So the next slide, I think it's just the second half of the ward, so the lower reports. Again, it's showing you the top elements of each ward. But as I said, in some of these wards, there is fewer cameras than in others. So you will get lower reports coming through. I mean, unless there's unless you've got any questions on that particular aspect of it, this is just an overview of how that's working. Thank you very much. I think I'd just add a couple of things. We've obviously started a fly tipping campaign as the council, sorry, working with the place team and enforcement together. And there's been the posters on bus stops and that sort of thing. So that's welcome. And, you know, it's a key issue for residents in particular wards, including my own. I think we'll also be doing a campaign around the PSPO, which will be very welcome as well to highlight awareness. I just wanted to note going backwards on the gun crime and the really significant decline in that we were on grand part yesterday, a team of us of police and council and talking to residents again, I don't think we can ever underestimate the difference that that operation has made. It's not perfect. There's always ongoing need, but the difference that has made for this borough in terms of where we were a year or so ago is quite extraordinary. And I also wanted to note on the robbery figures that have gone up that we'll be doing, I think it's both teams, family services and community safety, a specific violence reduction unit supported project starting very soon. So I don't know if anyone wants to mention that at all at this point. And yes, we'll keep an eye on the merit cases and just understand what's what's coming through that. I think Fiona, did you want to? No, not at all. And nice to see you, Declan. I just noticed that there's a number of instances that just has rough sleeping. Obviously that's not a crime and generally those individuals are incredibly vulnerable. So I wondered what does that prompt? Do your team then contact Streetlink? Do they contact outreach workers so that they can get access to support in a timely fashion? Yeah, thanks, Fiona. So the purpose of it on the CCTV slides is really that the CCTV operators are identifying where there is rough sleeping taking place that is then passed on. So we will always get a report every day. We get a report in community safety of basically these figures. And that will get passed on to our teams. They'll go out and they'll see who these people are. And we'll engage with the rough sleeping team as well. So they go out and then they can help these individuals. Does it also pick up people who are living in vehicles? It's a bit difficult for that because are they actually living it? Are they just waiting for somebody? I think when it gets reported to us as somebody living in vehicles, then the same process takes place. But whether it's picked up on a CCTV camera, it's a slightly different thing. Also, just to add that certainly from putting the CCTV in from the early figures and things, I was really encouraged by the number of welfare check calls that were also made with ambulances, et cetera, called for people in distress, which wasn't necessarily our priority when we put it in. It was very much on the policing and crime side. But that has always been a very welcome additional feature with this. I think if you're ready to move on, Chair, the next slide is pairing with prevent. Thank you. I think, as you can see, the most glaring figure six out there is a 53% increase, almost 53% increase, on the same period last year for Q1. The main reason for that is that Q1 of 22/23 was exceptionally low. We normally get around 30 referrals in a period, and it just happened that last year was quite low. Some of those that came in, what you might see, there's a 125% increase on mixed, unclear and unspecified. Those areas will be changed going forward. I think SO15 and the Home Office are trying to understand those referrals a bit more, so they're breaking down rather than the broader, other or mixed, unclear. They'll be breaking down to lots of different areas, so maybe next time I'll be reporting something a bit different. But some of the things, for example, that we did see rising this year came from those low-level antisemitism that very much were associated with the current conflict that's going on in the area at the moment, some odd ones with a young person bringing in an imitation firearm, someone calling for medieval law to be brought back. Also, we had someone referring to Elliott Rogers, who was an infamous multiple-killer, a multiple-school shooting. There's a lot of areas there, but if we look at the next page, the next slide, rather, which compares to national figures, what we see there are very, very similar to what the rest of the country are reporting. As always, we always report higher levels of young people being referred, because we are in a borough, in an area that we're fortunate enough to have a Preventive Education Officer up until April of this year, and I think schools are just a lot more aware. Just going forward, though, we have seen a tour – we've had a couple of referrals – that have been associated with the national riots, and these were quite other ways, really, that the people who have been identified just happened to be seen in the media by people who knew them, and they featured in papers, so quite public incidents, but they, going forward, you may see that rise as we understand all those referrals come forward. Thank you. Any questions? I would just like to note at this point that the Council, which you've been very involved with and the different teams, has been doing a review of our work on hate crime and community cohesion very much. We were going to be doing that anyway, because the strategy concludes this year, but to co-produce and have a dialogue with all of our communities, and there will be work coming up in Hate Crime Week and beyond to start a conversation and to very much highlight the strengths of this borough, as well as understanding the issues that are out there, so thank you. I can't see any questions online, either, and I'm also aware that some people online are in the room, too, which is a bit confusing as well. Hello, Chris. So I think that's it on these slides, then, and we'll move on to – sorry, Claire's about to tell me we need to note them, so we've noted the slides and thank everyone for their contribution and their work. That takes us on to, I think, the more detailed update, verbally, from the North West BCU police, if that's okay. Sorry, I think it's – yeah, it's okay, and I'm a bit confused with the mics as well today, so I think we're moving on, if you've got anything, verbally, to update at this point. Yeah, that's fine. Great. Okay, so we'll take that, and we've had your update within the slides. Thank you. That takes us on to Item 9. Before we start the family services update, I would like to thank a note for the whole team, the really good Ofsted review, including outstanding in one of the categories. We are really proud of the work that it's done and thank the team very much. Sorry, I'm having a bit of mic trouble. Okay, so you have the report, so I won't go through it in incredible detail, but just pick out some of the key highlights from the domestic – we'll start with the domestic abuse report. I'm sorry, I'm having some IT challenges this morning, so I'm flicking through paper. Please excuse the noise if it's making on the mic. So you'll see on page 4 that we are – we're halfway through most of our objectives in the domestic abuse and violence against women and girls strategy. We have about a quarter of our actions in progress, and then we have about 20 per cent where we are expecting them to start this year. So those actions are expected to be finalised by the end of March 2025, and that will coincide with the development of our new strategy for domestic abuse involved that we are starting consultation on now, which will run from 2025 to 2028. So, just in terms of the rates, we've just seen the police rates on the domestic abuse, but we are the fourth – we're showing us the fourth lowest rate in London in terms of reported domestic abuse incidents, but we're also showing us the third highest rate in London for positive outcome rates, which used to be known as the sanction and detection rates, so that's positive news for Barnet. We haven't – we've seen some fluctuations in domestic abuse referrals in terms of volume, but I'll come to that in a minute. We've been running some very successful children's groups and we've modified them, so these groups are for parents and for children, to help them overcome their experiences with domestic abuse, and hopefully, break cycles of future generational abuse, and they're delivered through our early help services. Training has continued throughout the quarter, it's still well attended, and we've got some feedback in the report about some of the people that have accessed some of our courses as well. Just on the IRIS program, I think it's important to note on the IRIS program, we still don't have sign-up from a group of GPs, and it's been three years now that we've not been able to engage those GPs in that sign-up. I suppose we have to – we're going to be doing a bit more analysis on whether or not we're still getting referrals from those GP surgeries, because I think that's what we don't know, so we can see the GPs, their surgeries and their volumes of referrals coming in. We have seen a reduction of, I think, it's 13% in quarter one of referrals from GPs, but that's kind of in line with the reduction in referrals for domestic abuse across the board, so we don't know if that's specific to GPs. But we are going to take a closer look at that for quarter two. The Victim and Prisoners Act 2024 received a Royal Assent in May 2024, and that now places a statutory responsibility on police forces to share information with schools about domestic abuse incidents – that's Operation Encompass – and we're working with schools and the police to make sure that that's implemented. As the chair, Councillor Conway, just noted, there's a note in here about the feedback from the Ofsted Inspection of Local Authority Children Services that we had in June, and they recognised that the MARIC was working well and that social work is in our Children and Family Services, understand the domestic abuse impact on children and that it's clearly articulated in assessments and that we're working as an organisation to help parents overcome their experiences of abuse. So, yeah, the MARIC referrals, we've seen a reduction of 30%, quite a significant reduction in MARIC referrals in quarter one. Actually, that's over the last 12 months, not quarter one. But again, it's synonymous with all the other reductions that we're seeing, and we're just interested to know why that's happening. Sixty-one percent of our MARIC referrals are around physical violence in the relationship, which is linked to the high-risk nature of the MARIC in any event. So we have prevention fund that's enabling us to deliver some training, and we've been doing workshops for practitioners and residents and partner organisations around hate crime involved. And there's a study in there about the work that was done with resources for autism and barnet men cap. We have 20 professionals and volunteers attend that. So that's positive and we'll continue rolling those out. There's some case studies in there from victims, and I think what they're doing is highlighting the courses that we are running for victims and survivors, that they're having an impact, that they're helping women feel safer and to develop confidence to hopefully not go in to stay safe from abusive relationships and hopefully not repeat those cycles of victimisation. So we've invited SOLIS because the reduction in referrals, and we've also seen a reduction in the uptake. So the number of women or victims that have referred to SOLIS for help and support, there's a larger percentage in this quarter of cases being declined, and we're curious about why that is. So we're inviting them to come to the quarter two, that will be reported in quarter two. They'll be coming to the next board to help us understand the rationale behind their decision making for referrals. Good to note that we've had a fourth Barnet Refuge open. It's been opened by the Iranian Kurdish Women's Rights Organisation, has eight bed spaces for single Middle Eastern, North African and Afghan women who are fleeing domestic abuse. So really positive to see that additional resource in the borough. And I think the one-stop shop, we're still seeing good multi-agency working through the one-stop shop, and we're still seeing good footfall through that service. We can see that the links to housing, the links to temporary accommodation, I think they're a bit of a challenge. I don't think we have housing colleagues here today, but that's a bit of a challenge because lots of women who are fleeing domestic abuse want to leave, want to stay in the local area, and we don't have properties in the area to enable them to stay. I feel like we should all stand up for something. So we're working with housing to have a look at how we can determine priority around those women and children that need to stay in the borough, and those that could move out of the borough. But we're also considering ideas around perpetrators leaving the property and making sure that they're the ones that are going to TA rather than children, causing more disruption. Okay, so the perpetrator programme, so the CIFA programme, we've only got funding until, it's been very successful in rolling that out across the other ten boroughs, really good partnership working there. Unfortunately, we don't have agreement for funding beyond March 2025 at this point, so it will be a shame to lose that provision. It's really making a difference, and every time we hear from perpetrators who are using the programme, they give such strong and positive feedback about the way that it's considering domestic abuse in a cultural context. So we hope after the autumn budget statement that we might get some news on potential funding for next year, but maybe I'm being optimistic. So you can see here in the report that the volume of domestic violence prevention notices and domestic violence prevention orders that have been granted, and the number of Claire's law disclosures and outcomes, and that's on a steady pace. As you know, we've launched the Safe Haven pilot in March, and we are now at the point of review, so that's been live for six months now, so we're having a review of how that's working, so we're linking with those three premises that have the Safe Haven tools and stickers to look at what impact that's having, whether people are aware of what it is, and whether people are using it, and whether there's a need for us to roll that out in certain premises across the rest of the borough. So that's happening now, that review. Any questions on domestic abuse involved before I move on to reducing offending? Sorry, if I could just say a couple of things. One is I think it would be really helpful for councillors to understand, with solace, and why certain things aren't being progressed. Sorry, I know myself, I refer residents there, so I think that would be really helpful to have some sort of communication back on that. In terms of the Safe Haven assessment, I think we agreed that we'd do that through the winter period, because we think that there might be more take-up starting to happen as it gets darker earlier. In terms of CIFA, the administration very strongly supports its continuation, and if there's any sort of letter or communication you need from the chair, I'm very happy to do that. And lastly, I would suggest maybe Barnet Homes, when they're next here, if they can give us an update on how the accreditation process is going. I think it would be helpful if we could note that. Yep, thank you very much. Does anyone have any questions or comments on this section? No? Okay, thank you. So, just on to reducing offendings. In similarity, the Youth Justice Plan also does feel like a good time to be updating strategies at the moment, so the Youth Justice Plan is, we've just produced our annual report for last year, that was taken to the Overview and Scrutiny Committee, and we are now working on developing our Youth Justice Plan for 2025 to 2026 or 7, and that will be in production, it will need to go to full council for sign-off next year, so we'll be working with partners to develop that. So we're in Year 2 of our current strategy and this report provides an update on quarter one. I mean, it's all pretty positive in as much as Barnet's first-time entry rates is lower than London and the national averages, reoffending rates are lower than London and the national averages, and our custody rates are also lower. So the Barnet Youth Offending Service is doing a pretty good job on supporting young people to stay out of the criminal justice system through their out-of-court disposals and prevention programmes, and also to make sure that when those young people are coming into the system, that we reduce the risk of recidivism for those young people. So, yeah, it's a pretty positive story. So, in the quarter one Youth Justice Management Board, we focused on tackling disproportionality. It's acknowledged that we have disproportionality in our Youth Justice cohort. You can see from the data that we've got on page 18, which is about the young people's arrest and disposal statistics, and overwhelmingly we see a larger proportion of young black males. The stop and search is starting to improve, those numbers are going down, but the arrest is still higher. What we don't understand is what happens at charge, so we can't see if there's disparity at the charging point, so we know that we have more young black people arrested, but do they get the same outcomes at the point of charging? So we've asked the Youth Justice Police to help us try and understand that picture a little bit clearer, but we can see through the report that they are more likely to be charged for an offence, and less likely to be handed down an out-of-court disposal, so we do know that, but what we can't see is the tariff of offending, so we can't see whether black boys are just being arrested for more serious crimes, and therefore are not appropriate for out-of-court disposals, so that's a further piece of work that the Youth Justice Board and partners will be completing. So we know already we've tackled, we've spent a lot of time as a partnership tackling exclusions of black boys from education, and we've been able to bring that number down, so we knew back in 2021 when we started this work that black boys were more than twice as likely to have an exclusion than white children in Barnet schools, and as a local authority, Barnet had a higher rate of exclusions of black boys than other boroughs in north London, so we've had a tackling disproportionality groups tackle that, and we've reduced that, so it feels more balanced now, although we're seeing different children now being subject to exclusion, so we're keeping an eye on those particular groups, and suspensions, and that's part of the work that Chris is doing with schools as well, to have a look at those young people who are being suspended but not permanently excluded. We're also focused on our young people who are not in education, employment and training, and when we looked at our cohort, we could see of our need, the not education, employment training cohort, 66% of them were male, and 58% of them were from black and other minority ethnic groups, so we've got disparity and disproportionality in that group as well, so we can see it right through the youth justice system. Similarly, transfers to probation, 80% of the boys, they were all boys that were transferred in the year to June 2024, 80% of them were from black and other minority backgrounds, and what we don't yet understand is at what point were they arrested and what charges they had, and what was the kind of trigger for transferring to probation, so we need to just understand some of that detail a little bit clearer. Just to let you know that we have a, there's a Pan London stop and search pilot, it was launched in Haringey as a pilot about a year or so ago, Haringey council worked with the police and they dip sampled groups of children who were subject to stop and search to identify vulnerabilities in that particular group. We don't ordinarily, hadn't ordinarily received police notifications for children that are subject to stop and search, and what that audit found was that the children, some of these children were children that were in care, that had additional vulnerabilities, and the systems around those children were not being informed about these incidents, which meant that support couldn't be given to those children, so together with the police and Haringey they've launched a campaign across London, so it's now a Pan London pilot, and Barnet alongside colleagues across London are going to be doing dip sample or dips on our own stop and search children, and feed into that wider piece of work, and hopefully that will create a national change. I do have a question about that, but, and also the proportionality of it, and as long as, I know you're looking at it from, in terms of ethnic background, race, are you also looking at it in the context of disability, so I'm thinking about diverse, neurodiversity and mental health? The Haringey findings showed that there was a disproportionate number of children with SCN, EHCP, so there are vulnerabilities in this cohort of children, but we also know that the children that are in the justice system are similarly, they're over represented if they've got EHCP, so social communication difficulties in particular, so yeah. So we'll let you know how that goes, so we're just starting that now, and that's being led by Di Dave La Riviere and Cezanne from our youth justice team, so they're representing us in that piece of work. Tina, can I suggest maybe they come to a future board meeting to present on that at an appropriate time, I think would be good, because that would follow on from the report that you did last year, so do you want to, yeah, go ahead Ray. Thanks Chair, I just wanted to ask Tina, because I know we've asked before about the numbers of autistic young people that you might be, the teams might be working with, and the issues they face, I mean that's something we're keen on, both from the safeguarding adult board's point of view and developing the autism strategy, and I was just wondering if somebody perhaps could come to the access to justice subgroup where we could go through that in more detail, I think it would be really helpful, we've got one in early December, and I suppose I'd be keen especially to be looking at the pathways we've got from either autistic people who are offending, autistic people who are victims of crime, and what pathways have we got to support another working well, because there's a lot of support out there, it's just making sure that those pathways are working effectively, so if we could get somebody down to the access to justice group in December that would be great, thanks. It might be something that our clinical, we've got a clinical psychologist in the team and she's working largely with that, so I'll, please send me the dates and I'll forward the invite to her, and if she can't come I'm sure somebody else from the team will. So we also had a look at our restorative justice and victims programmes, that's been working really, really well, so we're working with young people to help them make reparations for their crimes and make contact with victims and write letters of apology and or meet with victims to, so we're holding restorative conferencing, so we're having, interestingly, a number of victims don't want to engage in that process, but the young people are being encouraged to write those letters even if the victims don't want to receive them, so that they are thinking about the consequences of their actions and the impact that their crimes have on the victims, so that's been a positive piece of work. We've got lots of young people involved in community reparation and we've had five new sites set up in Quarter 1, so we've got Edgware, Library, Little Village, Second Chance, Chipping and Osage Libraries are now sites for our young people to get involved, and we're giving young people AQA certificates, so that's recognised as part of their achievements as well, which has been really positive. We've given 112 of AQA certificates in Quarter 1, so lots of certificates being given out. Okay, so there's some stuff around, some online materials that have been published, and there's a link for you to have a look at that, and we'll report in Quarter 2 on the Youth Justice Residential, another successful residential in Surrey, I think we were this time, but that was really positive, and we've been working with an Olympian, BMEXA, who's been delivering a programme in the borough, him and his brothers and his father run a company now, teaching track racing skills, and it's focused on black young boys. That's been really positively received, so we hope we can continue that partnership if we have available funding. So the last part is on the Integrated Offender Management and the Reducing Offending Delivery Group, so the IOM, the stats are all reported within the report. We've been looking at the transition for young people, recognising, and we were talking about this in this Youth Justice Matters Board that we just had yesterday, there's definitely a gap between young people coming out of the youth justice system and then something happens in those intervening years before they end up in IOM, where they're now persistent, violent, prolific offenders, so we don't know what's happening in that space for those young people because there's not many services connected to them post-18. So we're trying to understand how we can make that better for those young adults. So we can see that in Quarter 4, we didn't have the Quarter 1 data for this year, but in Quarter 4 we saw violence moving to the top of the offences for IOM, which had taken over from theft in Quarter 3, but as expected, drugs, weapons, robbery are all in those top five categories. Okay, so I think that's all from me on this one. Thank you. Any questions? Thank you very much. Are there any questions at all? Any further? No? Great, thank you. So that's for noting. And then we move on to Item 10, which is Update to Serious Violence Duty and Violence Reduction Plan, which Chris Kelly is going to take us through. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Again, I would refer my colleagues and yourself, Chair, to the report and also the Violence Reduction Plan that's contained within the documents. I thought it'd be helpful just to highlight some key achievements, really, and kind of key outputs that we've seen over the last quarter. So starting kind of on Page 5, under Governance, we continue to have a really strong partnership arrangements to join up, both strategically and also operationally as well. Very much it's evidenced through the various panels and also strategic groups in terms of TTCG, MACE, CS MARAC, and also problem-solving groups as well, which really seeks to establish a understanding of the presenting needs and themes that are emerging and then also around kind of the actions in terms of mitigating risk around violence and also exploitation as well. A regularly distributing information in terms of our key partners as well in a proportionate way, support awareness, raising kind of the outward focus in terms of our partners understanding the local issues within communities and things as well, and also then being really kind of clear in terms of how they can raise further concerns that either, for example, their schools or various groups and young people that are raising know where to report back to. In terms of analysis and enforcement, we have a range of obviously police-led operations to address kind of localised needs. Again, a lot of that is identified through the partnership and governance arrangements that we have around kind of strategic meetings and also operational meetings as well. We've obviously heard from MPS colleagues around some of the successes that they've had over the last quarter around the reduction of violence against the persons, which has seen an 11% decrease, and also in terms of a decrease of violence against persons with injury as well. We have seen during call to soup one, which has already been discussed and highlighted, an increase around kind of knife crime offences, but that is not in relation to injury, and we feel that that is really just a potential impact of the increased operations and presence that we have within the communities at the moment. So we are very kind of keen in terms of targeting kind of areas that we are aware of that are linked in relation to kind of violence and things, and one of the things that we are doing in relation to that is obviously then triangulating and galvanising our outreach programmes and also our My Ends project when it comes online and also the Safer Schools Robbery Safety Initiative as well. We will see kind of increased activity in call to two around Project HADR as well, which again is predominantly a police-led but is also a partnership initiative as well, which will look at kind of a holistic way in which drugs are being tackled and also the associated crimes as well, so that would be something that would be reported back on in terms of next quarter. In terms of reducing access to weapons, we continue to work with our Barnet Education and Learning Service to track excluded and suspended young people, certainly where there has been some indications around either kind of weapons carrying or violence within the context of schools as well, and really kind of one of the things that leads to is targeting around their Restorative Justice hub and coordinating them will go into the schools and try to work with them in relation to pulling around kind of restorative conversations with young people, and also that it then leads to additional development around training, workforce development and stuff like that as well. What we've seen around our Restorative Justice over the last quarter is that they've gone into four schools with a total of 102 participants that have been involved in training, and at the moment what's happened is that that has then resulted in them actually taking on kind of more of a restorative conversations between people, between staff members and also young people as well, and then looking at kind of some forms of mediation and restorative meetings in relation to that as well. In terms of our outreach and detached, so looking at the activity which is occurring around that, during quarter one we've had 67 sessions where we've had our outreach workers that have been targeting and being present within our communities. That's totaled 201 hours of delivery, and during that time we have reached 186 young people, and we're finding, similar to the previous year really, that the majority of engagement is with males, so that's around 56% certainly during quarter one, and that the primary age group that we appear to be engaging with and that are also receptive in relation to engagement is around that 12 to 15 age group as well, which we're quite positive around as it offers potential diversionary work, especially when you look at the strategic needs assessment and actually our higher range cohort in terms of violence and stuff tends to be class 18 as well, so we're hoping that it will lead to diversionary work in relation to that. Some of the themes that emerged from the outreach work obviously get reflected back in terms of the governance arrangements and the range of meetings that we have, so examples of that is around of course CS MARAC and strategic base, and one of the positives that have come out from that as well is that we have found an unusual and unexpected theme of young people actually expressing an interest to becoming peer mentors and also becoming outreach workers themselves, which has been really, really good. So what we are really excited about is that that dovetails really beautifully into our Mayans projects, which will be coming online certainly in quarter two, which will then look at developing peer mentors and also kind of helping expand the outreach program as well, so we will have some continuity around the delivery of that over the course of the next year. Is that the project with Arts Against Knives as well? It is indeed, yeah. So I think coming from a background in the youth sector that that is really, really welcome in terms of young people being able to step forward and encourage others is fantastic, thanks. I just wanted to check it was that project, thank you. So the other part, just to link to that as well, is that our after school safety initiative projects, which is looking at tackling kind of localised robberies, certainly within our transport hubs, we have started to mobilise and come online in relation to that during quarter one through our partnership with NPS. So that has been through the marking of mobile phones, we've begun to get in contact and be present within our schools as well, and also to raise awareness around that. And we've just appointed the two workers that will then be mobilised to actually be providing the community safety aspect and then also around the outreach aspect within our transport hubs, and it's expected they will start in quarter two. So working with our communities, we continue to deliver around our contextual training. So that is both to our VCS partners, grassroots organisations, as well as partners as well, and that we also continue to have a substantial and comprehensive wraparound in terms of when serious incidents do occur. So what we are able to do is look at attending and facilitating a range of community impact meetings where there have been incidents of violence, and to then be looking at coordinating the input through our violent integrated clinical service, and then also any other support charities, businesses that can potentially help support around the collective and individual kind of trauma and emotional impact around that. In terms of building on the victim's care hub, quarter one had seen a total of 54 referrals, which is forecast to be well over what we had intended to deliver, and clearly there is a significant demand in relation to the victim's care hub. We're seeing that the type of referrals are really coming from a range of different partners, but children and young people services, of course, community safety, police, and we're really focused at the moment on promoting greater awareness around the victim's care hub in terms of housing colleagues as well, and that's because there's been a range of coordinating meetings over quarter one, which has kind of indicated vulnerability of housing tenants, which has then resulted in coordinated activity, and we want to make sure that there is a comprehensive support there for the victim as well. Just I made a referral myself last week, and that was something I was fortunate to go on a ride along with the police response team, and so I think it would be helpful to join up there, actually, for some of those cases to increase awareness of the support hub, because it proved very useful, and it was very useful to be able to offer that support. Thank you, Councillor. I'll make sure that it's prioritised. Thank you, and also, you know, thanks to the team, both on restorative justice and the victim support hub, who responded incredibly quickly to that. Thank you. In terms of kind of the nature of the referrals, we find that the majority of referrals are around crime prevention, in terms of kind of general things, and then the next area which we are seeing quite significant demand on is in relation to victims of common assault and also knife crime as well, and then around exploitation, so specifically around criminal exploitation. We see, in terms of the breakdown around those 54 referrals, 34 of those were adults, 24 of those were children, and again, we're seeing more males that are engaging in the context of that service and stuff as well, so 32 males which we were working with in terms of victims. And I'll hold there for any questions from colleagues. I guess just an observation for me, I know the duty kind of goes up to 25 in terms of interventions. I noticed that a lot of the kind of outreach work, diversionary work, kind of stopped at 18, and just in the kind of language, it's around kind of young people. I'm kind of wondering what focus we have as an authority around young adults and those 18 to 25s, particularly around, you talked a lot about the kind of educational piece, how far are we into FE colleges and to some degree, some universities where people are coming in with that kind of serious violence piece post 18. So in terms of restorative justice, we have begun to work with Middlesex University and that we do have existing links in terms of Barnett and Southgate as well. What I was going to say, with the outreach side of things, it's really interesting because the project is actually scoped to be working with also and engaging with young adults up to the age 25 as well, and we continue to try and engage with our plus 18 cohorts when out and about. And there is a reluctance in relation to that, however, the workers are continuing and they are absolutely aware that they need to continue to try and engage in terms of that age group. So I guess how do we, from a probation service, we're dealing with those adults, how do we engage in that process and ensure that our young people know that these services exist locally? Sorry, could you repeat that just a second? That's okay. So from a probation perspective, where we're often working with these young people as both perpetrators and victims, how do we ensure that we can promote the accessibility to those services locally? So I think that it's around making sure that there's an awareness within probation in terms of what services and local services are around. What we can do is that there is kind of a community directory which has been pulled around as part of the needs assessment for the serious violence duty as well, which outlines a range of kind of youth provisions that were focused around supporting young people, around awareness of weapons and violence and things as well. That can absolutely be shared and I can ping the crossover to your workers and things as well. The other thing as well with that is that we also try to ensure that kind of the adults risk panel is coordinating some of that activity for also those young adults and things that we're worried about in terms of violence as well. And my final question Chris, sorry to be pleased to know, will the kind of intervention such as that kind of peer mentoring that you've talked about be available to that 80s/25 cohort as well? So we are really kind of focused in terms of looking at trying to expand on universal offers around mentoring for that older age group. At the moment there is a bit of a gap as kind of highlighted by Tina around the IOM cohort as well, post 18 to them becoming a little bit older and that's something that we're really focused on in terms of looking at what potential opportunities there are in terms of funding and projects and around also how we can effectively engage and help continue to promote different trajectories for that group as well. Thank you and it does sound like an area for future work for co-production with young people as well and I can see Tina's got a hand up and there might be more we want to pick up in the private bit of the meeting as well, thank you. I'm just thinking Karim that when we get information about London Crime Prevention Fund because the ex-offender mentoring service that we have that's attached to the IOM that's funded through the London Crime Prevention Fund and we haven't yet, correct me if I'm wrong Matt, we haven't yet had any requests, we haven't been given the amount that we've got available to us for the next three years yet and all of that funding is part of that funding suite that runs out in March 25, but when and if we get an invitation to set out what we'd like to deliver over the next three years we could certainly, I think because we know that we've got this gap that we could extend that programme to younger probation cohorts, so young adult cohort that's open to probation, not just specifically IOM. Yeah because IOM is only 25% of the young people on IOM and they are a specific group of individuals that actually get a lot of support in other areas anyway, but I'm thinking more broadly about the generic caseload as you've highlighted and we do have loads of young adults on our caseload that are not IOM. I think it's something we definitely need to look closer into together and with certain local partners as well. I think Matt wants to say something, thanks. Yeah, chair, unfortunately we received apologies from Alice Bird from MOPAC for this meeting, the two items that I was hoping Alice could give us an update on, I've chased it in the background via email, is number one, Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London is currently out to local authorities consulting on the police and crime plan that has to be published by the 31st of March of next year, 2025, in previous funding streams for the local crime prevention fund, which is the sole money that is being referred to in this matter, we were given quite short notice for submission of bids, which Chris and I completed, so what I've asked is, number one, could we try if possible please and have some kind of earlier prior notice so we can bring it to elected members and colleagues to determine what we would like to propose to use that funding for and two, could you try and indicate as best as you can, allowing for the current circumstances nationally, what that funding, grant funding offer is likely to be and what you would wish for, excuse me, London and specifically Barnet local authorities to seek to invest in and what would be your running time for that. The problem that we have with grant funding, especially from grant funding streams such as MOPAC is, it's often decided in quite short notice for those agencies or those services to then make that grant submission, so we can plan but we can't predict and that is a vulnerability for us from the work streams that we're doing already. Having said that, we've put that representation in, I've asked Alice via email yesterday, okay you can't come, could you please try and give us some kind of indication and I'll carry that on as a piece in the background and obviously brief, Claire and Dec according. Very much so, I'd also like to note just how well the relationship between the different departments in the council is working, particularly the two of you and the bids that have come through this year, I'm aware that it's a healthy challenge that we all give ourselves in the way things are constructed in Barnet and I think it's very welcome. I also have squibbled a note myself on the MOPAC issue, I'm very happy to take that up, we're very happy to take that up as an administration and if there's any appropriate meetings, letters etc, we can have a chat afterwards about that, thank you. I didn't have anything else to add, Councillor. Thank you very much, that was really detailed and obviously a very important area of work for everybody and thank you for the questions as well, so we note that and we move on to item 11 which is the hate crime update, thank you. Thank you very much. I hope you've always had an opportunity to read the report, I'm sure you're very aware of what's been happening nationally with the riots, all of which mostly was driven by fake news, misinformation. We've seen a rise of over 200% in anti-Semitism in Barnet alone since the October conflict that began last year and one third of all anti-Semitism across London happens in Barnet as well, so we've got together things, there's a focus, we need to be focusing on community cohesion. One of those areas I think is tackling hate crimes, so together with Councillor Conway, the comms team, myself, lots of different areas across the local authority, we've been looking at how can we in some way drive or tackle hate crime. This report really just brings together what we're doing currently and this is just the start, there's lots of things happening in the future, we've got the Hate Crime Awareness Week coming up in October, there is a comms campaign will be starting right on the back of that, we also have a Hate Crime Summit that is also planned for early October and really I just want to highlight some of the areas in here, some of the things we're doing at the moment across the local authority, the community safety team, one of the priorities is access to justice for people who are victims of hate crime really just to ensure that people feel comfortable and confident in reporting their hate crimes. Myself, the hate crime lead obviously and I do a lot of work with schools, early intervention, classroom settings, bullying, discrimination, resilience about hatred, online we have lots of funding come from the SCF now, lots of the shared endeavour funding which has seen a lot of organisations and I hope at the next meeting I have some outcomes of those deliveries, many of that, much of that, in fact not all of it, is happening within schools looking at anti-discrimination, hate crime, online resilience, critical thinking, that kind of thing, the task and finish group I think I've just mentioned and we will have a bit more information on that comms update I believe a bit later on, we've got someone from comms going to give a bit more detail about that summit and the campaign. We have the Hate Crime Awareness Campaign at the beginning, the Community Capacity Project that has just finished, I'm hoping to have some outcomes from that as well, obviously we have Ray representing, Mencap here as well with the Zero Tolerance to Hate Crime Projects and I think you might be given a quick update when I finish this, is that ok? I know we've got a great opportunity there now, Fayez is doing absolute wonders at Mencap there. We have the Family Services as well, the Resources Toolkit that Tina shared with us at an earlier meeting that I've been sharing with schools and other professionals, etc, etc. With our partners, the police as well, there's a lot of focus I think on some of those events that are tied to the Palestine and Israel conflict as well, Michael Buckley as well, we've been very much engaged with local authority, with Ray, with Fayez, with the comms team really so we can just work together to drive and tackle this head on. There's a Why Me campaign video, there's a new video for immigrants or unaccompanied young people, it's just been launched as well, 22 local authorities have come together to put that together, one of those videos focuses on, in over 100 languages, focuses on the justice system as well, so we're hoping that people have the confidence to come forward, report more so we can understand a lot more. The Safer Spaces Scheme as well, again another thing that has been driven by the community, the zero project, zero tolerance to hate crime projects, and really just going forward, this is not where it stops, this is where it starts, anyone who has any thoughts or comments or suggestions of how we can improve reporting more than anything else, we know that hate crime isn't one of the massively unreported crimes, any way we can ease that, we're looking at maybe expanding the reporting centres, a couple of mosques I think are interested in opening or at least developing some hate crime reporting there, I do believe I think Islamophobia, I mean Barney is very much underreported as well, so anyone, we're always open to suggestions, ideas, input, engagement, anything that can help us improve. Yes? It's not an idea that came from me, but we ran a focus group with our sleepers a couple of weeks ago, and they commented that in response to the Southport incident that led to a large rise across everyone, including in Barnet, in potential risks, everything closed and they were left really very vulnerable with nowhere to go, and asked that in future if you're doing emergency planning, that actually those who are sleeping in our borough feature into that, because they felt very vulnerable, left without any access to services, so I said I'd raise it here. Okay, so what group was that in particular? That's individuals who are sleeping rough in the borough. Okay, homeless, yes, very good point, very good point as well, and I think to be aware as well, we do have five hotels in Barnet that are housing asylum seekers, and much of the rights happening around the country, I mean, I say isolated, there were isolated incidents last year on a much smaller scale where people turned up in the hundreds, you know, angry, and because of fake news, you know, they're living five-star lifestyles while we are freezing or living on the streets, so yes, certainly homeless people, thank you. Fiona, I think if you could put that in writing as well, that would be really helpful, because what we're trying to do collectively is to start a conversation with all communities on this, so that the summit that's been proposed by officers that we're bringing together covers a range of different people coming to that first meeting, there will also be an opportunity for a discussion online, and the whole idea is that we start this conversation this October to co-produce with our communities where we go on this together. What has come very strongly as well, because my portfolio covers, and we deliberately constructed it like this, community safety and resident participation, so there's been a whole programme of round tables that we've been doing anyway through the year, as well as the leader listens, etc., and so there's a very keen sense from local communities, not that we just don't just look at hate crime, but that we look at community cohesion and we actually celebrate, highlight, extend the initiatives that run anyway across our borough, and I think I will always be this balancing voice, but I think the response in Finchley from meeting with the local communities, from the fact that it was possible for the multi-faith forum to go in collectively and address Friday prayers, all of the informal outreach that's happened, the support for asylum seekers locally, etc., we're not complacent, but it has been extraordinary and very encouraging alongside the very difficult figures and time that it has been for communities in this borough. I will do that, I will set out, because actually the people we spoke with were very complimentary about other aspects of support as well that they do see and can access, it was just that specific gap, and they understood, they understood why libraries closed, why everyone closed, because of safety issues, it's just they wanted to ensure that in future, so no, I'll do a summary of that whole discussion actually and fold it onto you so you can include that in the future. That would be really helpful, because there's obviously homeless action in various people and places, okay, came to mind as somewhere that we could do separate listening and discussions with. I'm also conscious that the police after that whole operation sent us all as partners, what do you think was missing, what could we do differently, I think we all operate a learning by doing approach as well, and are always interested in knowing what is and isn't working, which is part of this as well, is to look at how we kind of review things, keep things different, work with communities going forward, so thank you. I wanted to give a specific update really on the zero tolerance to hate crime part of things, because we have had a problem over the last year in that we did have a vacant pulse for about six months, so that did impact on the project. What we've done now is we've filled it, we've filled it temporarily, now we've just filled it permanently and someone's about to start. Where I'd say it's caused particular problems is that it meant we haven't had the programme of training and workshops, and there's been less support for the hate crime reporting census, and that's certainly I'd say impacted on the number of reports, so that's one of the things that we need to catch up on now, we've got people backing the post, and I'd say the census especially we use in the hate crime week as a way to kind of reinvigorate them. I think there's things they can do during the week that would promote themselves both to their own staff and to other users as well, so it has been a difficult period, and we do appreciate itself as being a time when hate crime has been very much to the fore, but we're ready to catch up now. Thank you. That's very welcome to hear because part of it is to refresh what was there before in terms of the hate champions network and newsletter and all of that kind of thing. I think a lot of people stand ready to help and to be part of something very positive locally, so that's great. I think I now need to read out, I don't need to read out the whole thing, thanks, that's a great relief to everybody, so we're just noting the recommendations and thanking everybody. That takes us on to item 12 which is the combatting drugs partnership update. I would note that in this area we try to work very closely together, we also operate learning by doing. I think the addition of Project Adda to the borough this year is making a really welcome contribution as well. Are we starting with Councilor Moore? I don't mind, but thank you both for being here, and Louisa as well who I think is online and we wish you well. Thanks. Thank you Chair. I will just introduce Louisa who will present the report and to highlight it is an annual report, an update, but also presenting the new structure of the combatting drugs partnership board for your information and noting how we'll continue working. And I'll hand over to Louisa, I hope she's feeling better today. Thank you very much Louisa and for joining us despite not being well which is really appreciated. I think the new structure is very welcome because I know when we've been at meetings it has often felt like there isn't enough time to discuss in depth certain things. I think one thing I would add is Operation Woodson which has been underway this year in Buntoke and the very close working relationship and cooperation between the police, community safety, youth outreach and Change Grow Live with very clear offer of support as well as enforcement going on there which I think is really appreciated by everyone and actually has had several conversations with communities locally about that as well so I think it's a wider education piece that happens. I think Councilor Moore would like to add something as well, thank you. I just wanted to firstly start by thanking all the officers both within the council and actually across partners because while we haven't had absolutely consistent presence at our board meetings, actually we really have done quite well compared with some of our other borough authorities in terms of getting partners around the table and it spans right the way across council departments such as public health and children's and family services. Housing very importantly have been engaging but the reality is that they're formal meetings and the real meat of the work goes on through those relationships that are built outside those formal meetings so I absolutely do support the reduction of the formal meetings to two a year. I was very clear though that they needed to be aligned with the schedules of dates for Health and Wellbeing Board and Safe Community Partnership Board because this is the public and transparent reporting of that work that we are able to report in public and it's also really important that timing gives input to strategic decision making by those two boards as well. So I support it but I want to make sure that that's aligned and also enjoy partners to really pick up the baton in terms of leading on that work. You've talked around the table today about some really good working across departments within and beyond the council, across police, with probation and a range of others and so I think it's another case where it's very much more than the sum of the parts and so it's about making use of the resources, sometimes scarce that we have, making sure it's targeted into the right place to get the very best for our local residents, particularly those who are struggling to get their lives back on track. Thanks very much. I should note also I bumped into Change Grow Live yesterday as well while I was out and about and spoke to them about working with us possibly as volunteers with a listening session around the development of the VORG and DA strategy that actually came from them and a chat and an offer so I was going to bring that up too. I think Claire's got something you'd like to add, thank you. Thank you Chair. Thanks, it's really good to see an update on how the partnership is working and all of the results. I know various colleagues around the table are involved in. With regards to the new structure, I think it looks like a really good structure going forward. I'd just like to add that we probably need to add in the overview and scrutiny on the top level of that chart because we have Crime and Disorder overview and scrutiny annually in the summer and last year Louisa did attend with an update from the Combat and Drugs Partnership so in terms of absolute oversight it would kind of feed into that, that sits across health and wellbeing board and to the Community Safety Partnership. It's a challenge I think, that's obviously very sensible. Thank you very much. I know we all sit in a lot of meetings but there is a really strong collaborative approach here across partners and all officers and it's really very welcome. Councillor Warren? If I might just, I should have said it when I was thanking officers, actually just a recognition that some of the work has been presented at Pan London and wider bodies as well so there is broader recognition of some of the work that's going on, particularly with young people. Great, thank you. So we note that as in the report and then we move on to our final item which is safety in parts. I would like to note two things here just before I hand over to Cassie. One is that this actually came from a comment originally from Overview and Scrutiny Committee who were wanting to see some, I think they were looking at they were going to do some stuff on parts but actually it worked with work we wanted to do so that link is really important and the dialogue with all councillors and I'd also like to thank my colleague Councillor Schneiderman for his work and his input on this because a cabinet system enables us to work very collaboratively as a team as well so that's really appreciated too. Thank you Cassie. Thank you Cassie. I think also to pick up on what you said about the volunteering groups and the incredible way in which residents sort of are active in our green spaces. I think often when I'm asked what do you mean by resident participation, it's very much how residents choose to engage and I think some of the way people feel safer certainly from having been on sort of some of the Friends litter picks and all of that sort of stuff in Burntoke and wider is because they're going together and there's a sense of community that you know something that starts as a litter pick transforms into something completely different with the connections locally which is really wonderful to see and I think there's been such a growth in that in the past few years in the borough. I've not been to the green spaces forum actually for a while so if it's helpful to sort of go to that, that was a meeting I used to go to quite a bit so if you'd like me to go okay in this sort of role that would be great. I don't know if anyone's got any questions or comments. Lots here, go ahead. Thanks chair, thanks Cassie. It's been a really detailed piece of work so thanks very much for coordinating it and everybody that's been involved. The one thing I just wasn't sure which I just wanted to check for clarity really which isn't included in the report necessarily or the recommendations but we have spoken about it previously was around where we've got venues in parks such as cafes etc etc just looking at what the leases or contracts that we have so if for example they you know the operating hours whether there's antisocial behaviour or any safety concerns linked with a venue what kind of conditions we have and I know that you said that would be a wider review I just didn't want to lose it in this piece of work. Thank you, I think that would be great because also once I understand what you're saying and I've had conversations myself with the estates team at points it's also very much about protecting the people that are taking those leases on as well so it's not just a prohibitive thing it's there to try and keep everybody safer and I think in certain situations would be very welcome. Declan. Thank you chair, just very quickly to mention that one of the big issues that we had and we were trying to work through was the public's perception of safety in the parks because it doesn't necessarily mean that parks are unsafe it's just that they feel unsafe or look unsafe and that's what the feel is. As you know we're working on patrols etc which will help with that high visibility presence we've got a couple of high visibility vans coming on board within the next couple of weeks yes that's right and that's coming away that will obviously feed into the results of what's going on and we'll keep Tabs and keep Cassie involved with that and how we're doing that and just to add that our police colleagues are also involved with the parks because they use our PSPO tickets as well so they're out there and this is all hopefully going to add to the perception of the parks being a much safer place. I think I'll just add as well that the reason we brought in a PSPO across the borough and the provisions there was very much from listening to residents on doorsteps across the borough and in the parks too so it's you know it's something that was developed very much with an item to all of that. I'm sure we'll be hearing more about the vehicles that are coming soon to our parks I know that's been a very long-term project by the council as well thank you very much Cassie to you Matt and all the team for your work on this thank you so we note that report. The forward work programme I don't know if anybody's got anything oh sorry Fiona just the safeguarding adults board annual review will need to be probably at the next meeting if that's at all possible just because then I'll be able to present it that's November the 29th yep could you send us an email just so we pick that up yeah thank you that's great does anyone have any other business of course wow I'll just switch the mic two very quickly things of this too but I will be really brief what both good news I think first one initially when I started back in 2017 the police raised concerns that there wasn't a tiny appropriate adult service for adults obviously children and families pay for and support young people who are brought into custody but there's no legal requirement for anybody to do that for adults. MOPAC have finally agreed to fund it and it will start in January 2025 Ray and I are meeting with the lead to look at KPIs and what could be reported to locally around the impact and how that's working so hopefully that'd be really welcome news to your custody officers it's definitely welcome news for our client base because they're brought into custody they should get more timely support the other bit of news I thought I'm sorry I'm stealing your Thundergreen but I think it's I've heard some very good things about the SDS 40 release earlier this month I have and I thought it might be oh so the prison release that happened earlier and I thought so I just wondered if we could have I know that the London they're looking at are there lessons to be learned and to because obviously there's another release in October but generally I wondered if we could have the highlights to the next meeting or something thank you very much so that both welcome bits of good news of course we will be talking in the private bit of the meeting about how that first face has gone and lessons done because it's something we're keeping a very close eye on so I think that would need to be a discussion as to what it's possible to bring to the next meeting what it is and and other routes for sharing that but thank you for raising that that's great so the next meeting is on the 29th of September so November we're in September so right it's certainly very busy and we'll see everybody then and thank you all very much for the contributions and thank you to everyone online thank you thank you you you [ Silence ]

Transcript

Hello, good morning, welcome. I'm Councillor Sara Conway, Chair of the Safer Communities Partnership Board. Thank you for attending our meeting this morning, both in the room and online. Please note that meetings may be recorded and broadcast by people present as allowed for in-law or by the Council. Can I please remind the board to use the microphone when speaking by pressing the middle speaker icon. Press once to turn it on and once to turn it off. We ask that you remain seated throughout the meeting unless you are called to the table to address the board. I don't think we need everyone to introduce themselves. I do know that my colleague, Councillor Moore, is here, who chairs the Combat and Drugs Partnership Board, and that is so that we can join up the work that the Council is doing on key statutory requirements and generally on community safety. Apologies for absence, I think it's Greg from Barnet Homes, and I think Corinne is going to join us a bit later. Minutes of the previous meeting, does everyone agree with the minutes? Yep, nodding on line two, thank you, so they're agreed. Do any members have any interest to disclose today? Nope, that's great. Public questions and comments, we don't have any. Matters arising, does anybody have anything they need to raise at this point? Nope. So we'll start with the performance update, quarter one, which I think is Declan and Matt and the police as well. I'd like to start, as I often do, by thanking everybody from all the teams for all the work they've been doing in the past quarter. I know it has been difficult, challenging, et cetera, but everybody has done their very best through some particularly difficult situations in the summer, which I also notice the remarkable way our communities have responded to coming together to the, not threat, the difficulties Barnet found itself in. Thank you. Good morning, Councillor, good morning, attendees. The performance dashboard is on the screen behind you, Lieutenant and Councillor Moore. I possibly invite you to rotate your chairs so you don't get a crip neck or you can follow it on your laptops. Just a reminder, next slide, please, Ben. Just a reminder of where the data is sourced from. All of the crime data is taken from the London data website for our monthly crime data dashboard collation and the slides that relate to Barnet Council's assurance group community safety team functions is taken from the community safety team's internal data sources. Next slide, please, Ben. The ranking is self-explanatory. However, for people who haven't visited this meeting before, the ranking structure above is indicative of where we are placed by comparison to our either London colleagues for other boroughs or in relation to our tribe borough colleagues, and our tribe borough being Brent and Harrow. Ben, next slide, please. The next set of slides are actually police performance data. Therefore, chair, with your permission, I'll hand off to my police colleague. Good morning, everyone. I hope you can hear me okay. So I'm going to go over the Berkeley figures in the last three months from April to June, 400 cases of residential Berkeley in Barnet. The previous three months we showed a downward trend of 16 out of the 32 boroughs, but we now have an emerging issue. We're up 22 out of the 32 boroughs. In comparison with the three months last year, we were one out of the three boroughs across the north-west, and that is obviously rising. So from that, there is an increase from 371 burglaries that's gone up to 400, which is up 7.8%. However, the year-to-date figures, the burglary has gone down for the year-to-date figures for that. I'll move on to burglary business and community. Three months from April to June, there were 120 cases of non-residential burglary. We were sitting 13th out of the 32 B.C.U.s. We are now 6th out of the 32, so we have an improving figure for that, and it's a downward trend we're showing. The comparison from the three months previously was that we were in the middle of the three boroughs on north-west, and we're still there, and that hasn't changed. For the non-residential burglaries, we were sitting at 159, and now we're down to 120. That's down 24.5%, but there's no year-to-date figures. It hasn't shown any increase or decrease. We're just static for that. I'll move on to robbery next. Our robbery figures are showing 161 cases of robbery of personal property in Barnet. That was previously nine out of the 32 B.C.U.s, and now we're showing 11. It's an emerging issue for the robbery, and against our other boroughs in north-west, again, we are sitting middle of the road for that. For robbery, it was 166. Previously, we are now 161, so it's down 3%, but overall, the year-to-date figures, we are up slightly with a 5.5% increase in robbery. If we go to violence with injury, three months today, it was 475 cases of violence with injury in Barnet. We were three out of the 32 boroughs, now down to the second-best within the Met, and we're also the best within the actual B.C.U. itself. For violence with injury, we were 572 previously. We are now shown as 475. That is down 17%, and also our year-to-date figures is down 6.8% for our violence with injury. The knife crime with injury, there's 19 cases of knife crime recorded in Barnet. We were six out of the 32 boroughs, now down to the fifth, best in the Met for improving figures, and we are also the best within the B.C.U. itself. For knife crime with injury, it was sitting at 22, and we are down to 19 cases. That's down 13.6%. However, we have got year-to-date figures. We're still up 18.6, but we are looking for that downward trend, which is really positive. Then moving on to our lethal-barrel discharges. There was one case of lethal-barrel discharge in Barnet. Previously, that was 21 of the 32 boroughs. We are now improving on that. We are down to the 12th best within the Met, and we are again the second within the B.C.U. itself. For lethal-barrel discharges, there were three cases previously in the period, and we are now down to one, so that's a 66.7% decrease. The year-to-date figures were also down 84.6% for lethal-barrel discharges. For domestic abuse, there were 146 cases of domestic abuse in Barnet. Of the three months, we were the third out of the Met, and we've actually improved on that number. We're down to the second best in the Met, and also the best within the B.C.U. itself. Previously, there were 178 cases. We are now down to 146 of domestic abuse cases. That's down 18%, and our year-to-date figures are also down 46%. I think I will hand it over to Declan now. Is that right, or Matt? It's my turn again. Thank you very much, Chair. If you are happy, I will proceed now with the anti-social behaviour data for the Borough. As you can see, colleagues, from the slides, the top left is the use of our tools and powers. The top right is fixed penalty notices, where we're tackling anti-social behaviour in the form of environmental crime, and in the bottom right is the community's trigger data. If I could just touch on a few headlines, it's quite obvious there are some uses of tools and powers that have not been used. That's not uncommon. It does depend upon where cases are and who is the lead agency for that case. However, in the current data, what is obvious is the use of the Public Spaces Protection Order has jumped in May, and middle point in June of May's figure, thereabouts. But the reason for that jump is the Community Safety Team annually do a co-operative piece with our Parks colleagues, and we carry out intensive enforcement with the Neighbour Police and Team and the Community Safety Team. We do it through the week, Councillor, but we also have an enhanced focus at the weekends and on Friday evenings. A lot of those offences, without going too granular for you, are linked to set open spaces where people misuse barbecues or park in such a way that they cause obstructions for other people to be able to use those facilities. The premises closure of the data, the three in June are linked to the three blocks that were closed in the Graham Park Estate as part of the ongoing work on Operation Dakota. I will touch on Operation Dakota workload in the CSMAIC slide after this one because there is a relevancy following the last couple of weeks' outcomes. The fixed penalty notice data is self-explanatory. It's the number that have been issued, the number that have been paid, those that haven't been paid. I've sat in my inbox, awaiting to be referred to HB-LUB for prosecution. And then the community trigger application, again, just because the community trigger, which is now on our website, has been changed because the Home Office changed the title of the way it's been case reviewed, but for the benefit of this meeting and wider knowledge we've left it in as a community trigger. It was only one for that period, which is good, but by the same token of reassurance to you, just because it might not meet the threshold for community trigger does not mean that case does not get the same scrutiny and level of review as a community trigger because we do want to make sure that we don't fail the victim or reporting party in any way. Next slide, please, Ben. You will obviously see two community safety matter meetings dated at CASF because it's a six-weekly rotation and the July meeting was on the middle of July. I think it was the 9th of July for memory. The reason why I'd like to have a quick highlight on the number of cases coming in and them lowering is because we have been waiting for the Operation Dakota court outcomes cases to come to fruition. That date has been provided now, so whilst it may be low in this period and I'm expecting to see it at the next meeting to have risen, not considerably but have risen, and basically we have shut down quite a few cases that have naturally come to their conclusion and end point and they have been provided in some of the case studies for the end-of-year report and there will be some of the case studies that go in your mid-year report for the community safety team for tackling anti-social behaviour. Do you have any questions on those two slides, CASF? In that case, then I'll hand over to Declan for the CCTV. Thank you, Matt. Chair, these next couple of slides are just a brief overview of the CCTV because it is just a three-month picture of what we're seeing and it's really to give you some confidence around how the CCTV is working rather than delving into the granular figures that they're seeing because they're not particularly indicative of what's happening across the borough. So the first slide is, as you can see there, what we've done is we've split the reactive and proactive use of CCTV. So 87% of what the CCTV guys are doing in the control room is actually identifying stuff outside, which we didn't have that capability before we are now. Only 13% of it is reactive and that is stuff that they may be hearing on the police radios and are then focusing in or they're being asked to focus in on a particular location because something is taking place. So you can see there's a massive difference between that. It just shows how good the facility is there for identifying information. When you look at the actual figures, there was just under 1,900 incidents recorded by CCTV just in that three-month period. So an extremely useful tool and having had conversations with police colleagues, I think they're finding it extremely useful as well. Overall, it was 101 CCTV requests from insurance companies during that three months. So again, things like your road traffic accidents, et cetera, are being captured and there is footage so that can be dealt with. The next slide, thanks Ben. The next slide really, what we've done this time round is we've split all 24 wards down into the top 12 and the bottom 12 of incidents. Now, it's a little bit of a different picture because not every ward has got the same number of cameras. So you will obviously have recorded more in those wards that have got much more cameras. But if we go through some of the statistics, you'll see, so Collindale North, for instance, the figures, 231 for ASB, Beggin 24, Rough Sleepers 22 and others. So I've got others down there and this is just the individuals. When you look at the number there, 53, that is over a 12 week period. So they are just individual incidents. It could be a fraud incident that they've heard about on the radio and we'll focus in to see what they can see. It might be an accident. It could be a road traffic collision, something like that. And there's just very few of them. So if we were to put them all on this report, you'd have like 30 pages. So I've just put it down under other. With the rest of the boards, you know, you can see how it filters down and you can see what the primary offences are that are being spotted. So I know we've spoken previously about Beggin and you can see how that's filtering out across the borough and how we're actually capturing evidence of that on the on the footage. And of course, that gives us the ability to either speak to police or deal with the matter ourselves via the community safety team. And the other elements of it, fly tipping is very important because that's a key priority for the community safety team. And when they're captured, you know, again, the information is you'll have a vehicle and a registration number and description of a person. And that's then passed on to the team to investigate. And that will inevitably result in an enforcement activity of sample or prosecution. So we're getting much better at that. And the evidence is now helping us with all of that. So the next slide, I think it's just the second half of the ward, so the lower reports. Again, it's showing you the top elements of each ward. But as I said, in some of these wards, there is fewer cameras than in others. So you will get lower reports coming through. I mean, unless there's unless you've got any questions on that particular aspect of it, this is just an overview of how that's working. Thank you very much. I think I'd just add a couple of things. We've obviously started a fly tipping campaign as the council, sorry, working with the place team and enforcement together. And there's been the posters on bus stops and that sort of thing. So that's welcome. And, you know, it's a key issue for residents in particular wards, including my own. I think we'll also be doing a campaign around the PSPO, which will be very welcome as well to highlight awareness. I just wanted to note going backwards on the gun crime and the really significant decline in that we were on grand part yesterday, a team of us of police and council and talking to residents again, I don't think we can ever underestimate the difference that that operation has made. It's not perfect. There's always ongoing need, but the difference that has made for this borough in terms of where we were a year or so ago is quite extraordinary. And I also wanted to note on the robbery figures that have gone up that we'll be doing, I think it's both teams, family services and community safety, a specific violence reduction unit supported project starting very soon. So I don't know if anyone wants to mention that at all at this point. And yes, we'll keep an eye on the merit cases and just understand what's what's coming through that. I think Fiona, did you want to? No, not at all. And nice to see you, Declan. I just noticed that there's a number of instances that just has rough sleeping. Obviously that's not a crime and generally those individuals are incredibly vulnerable. So I wondered what does that prompt? Do your team then contact Streetlink? Do they contact outreach workers so that they can get access to support in a timely fashion? Yeah, thanks, Fiona. So the purpose of it on the CCTV slides is really that the CCTV operators are identifying where there is rough sleeping taking place that is then passed on. So we will always get a report every day. We get a report in community safety of basically these figures. And that will get passed on to our teams. They'll go out and they'll see who these people are. And we'll engage with the rough sleeping team as well. So they go out and then they can help these individuals. Does it also pick up people who are living in vehicles? It's a bit difficult for that because are they actually living it? Are they just waiting for somebody? I think when it gets reported to us as somebody living in vehicles, then the same process takes place. But whether it's picked up on a CCTV camera, it's a slightly different thing. Also, just to add that certainly from putting the CCTV in from the early figures and things, I was really encouraged by the number of welfare check calls that were also made with ambulances, et cetera, called for people in distress, which wasn't necessarily our priority when we put it in. It was very much on the policing and crime side. But that has always been a very welcome additional feature with this. I think if you're ready to move on, Chair, the next slide is pairing with prevent. Thank you. I think, as you can see, the most glaring figure six out there is a 53% increase, almost 53% increase, on the same period last year for Q1. The main reason for that is that Q1 of 22/23 was exceptionally low. We normally get around 30 referrals in a period, and it just happened that last year was quite low. Some of those that came in, what you might see, there's a 125% increase on mixed, unclear and unspecified. Those areas will be changed going forward. I think SO15 and the Home Office are trying to understand those referrals a bit more, so they're breaking down rather than the broader, other or mixed, unclear. They'll be breaking down to lots of different areas, so maybe next time I'll be reporting something a bit different. But some of the things, for example, that we did see rising this year came from those low-level antisemitism that very much were associated with the current conflict that's going on in the area at the moment, some odd ones with a young person bringing in an imitation firearm, someone calling for medieval law to be brought back. Also, we had someone referring to Elliott Rogers, who was an infamous multiple-killer, a multiple-school shooting. There's a lot of areas there, but if we look at the next page, the next slide, rather, which compares to national figures, what we see there are very, very similar to what the rest of the country are reporting. As always, we always report higher levels of young people being referred, because we are in a borough, in an area that we're fortunate enough to have a Preventive Education Officer up until April of this year, and I think schools are just a lot more aware. Just going forward, though, we have seen a tour – we've had a couple of referrals – that have been associated with the national riots, and these were quite other ways, really, that the people who have been identified just happened to be seen in the media by people who knew them, and they featured in papers, so quite public incidents, but they, going forward, you may see that rise as we understand all those referrals come forward. Thank you. Any questions? I would just like to note at this point that the Council, which you've been very involved with and the different teams, has been doing a review of our work on hate crime and community cohesion very much. We were going to be doing that anyway, because the strategy concludes this year, but to co-produce and have a dialogue with all of our communities, and there will be work coming up in Hate Crime Week and beyond to start a conversation and to very much highlight the strengths of this borough, as well as understanding the issues that are out there, so thank you. I can't see any questions online, either, and I'm also aware that some people online are in the room, too, which is a bit confusing as well. Hello, Chris. So I think that's it on these slides, then, and we'll move on to – sorry, Claire's about to tell me we need to note them, so we've noted the slides and thank everyone for their contribution and their work. That takes us on to, I think, the more detailed update, verbally, from the North West BCU police, if that's okay. Sorry, I think it's – yeah, it's okay, and I'm a bit confused with the mics as well today, so I think we're moving on, if you've got anything, verbally, to update at this point. Yeah, that's fine. Great. Okay, so we'll take that, and we've had your update within the slides. Thank you. That takes us on to Item 9. Before we start the family services update, I would like to thank a note for the whole team, the really good Ofsted review, including outstanding in one of the categories. We are really proud of the work that it's done and thank the team very much. Sorry, I'm having a bit of mic trouble. Okay, so you have the report, so I won't go through it in incredible detail, but just pick out some of the key highlights from the domestic – we'll start with the domestic abuse report. I'm sorry, I'm having some IT challenges this morning, so I'm flicking through paper. Please excuse the noise if it's making on the mic. So you'll see on page 4 that we are – we're halfway through most of our objectives in the domestic abuse and violence against women and girls strategy. We have about a quarter of our actions in progress, and then we have about 20 per cent where we are expecting them to start this year. So those actions are expected to be finalised by the end of March 2025, and that will coincide with the development of our new strategy for domestic abuse involved that we are starting consultation on now, which will run from 2025 to 2028. So, just in terms of the rates, we've just seen the police rates on the domestic abuse, but we are the fourth – we're showing us the fourth lowest rate in London in terms of reported domestic abuse incidents, but we're also showing us the third highest rate in London for positive outcome rates, which used to be known as the sanction and detection rates, so that's positive news for Barnet. We haven't – we've seen some fluctuations in domestic abuse referrals in terms of volume, but I'll come to that in a minute. We've been running some very successful children's groups and we've modified them, so these groups are for parents and for children, to help them overcome their experiences with domestic abuse, and hopefully, break cycles of future generational abuse, and they're delivered through our early help services. Training has continued throughout the quarter, it's still well attended, and we've got some feedback in the report about some of the people that have accessed some of our courses as well. Just on the IRIS program, I think it's important to note on the IRIS program, we still don't have sign-up from a group of GPs, and it's been three years now that we've not been able to engage those GPs in that sign-up. I suppose we have to – we're going to be doing a bit more analysis on whether or not we're still getting referrals from those GP surgeries, because I think that's what we don't know, so we can see the GPs, their surgeries and their volumes of referrals coming in. We have seen a reduction of, I think, it's 13% in quarter one of referrals from GPs, but that's kind of in line with the reduction in referrals for domestic abuse across the board, so we don't know if that's specific to GPs. But we are going to take a closer look at that for quarter two. The Victim and Prisoners Act 2024 received a Royal Assent in May 2024, and that now places a statutory responsibility on police forces to share information with schools about domestic abuse incidents – that's Operation Encompass – and we're working with schools and the police to make sure that that's implemented. As the chair, Councillor Conway, just noted, there's a note in here about the feedback from the Ofsted Inspection of Local Authority Children Services that we had in June, and they recognised that the MARIC was working well and that social work is in our Children and Family Services, understand the domestic abuse impact on children and that it's clearly articulated in assessments and that we're working as an organisation to help parents overcome their experiences of abuse. So, yeah, the MARIC referrals, we've seen a reduction of 30%, quite a significant reduction in MARIC referrals in quarter one. Actually, that's over the last 12 months, not quarter one. But again, it's synonymous with all the other reductions that we're seeing, and we're just interested to know why that's happening. Sixty-one percent of our MARIC referrals are around physical violence in the relationship, which is linked to the high-risk nature of the MARIC in any event. So we have prevention fund that's enabling us to deliver some training, and we've been doing workshops for practitioners and residents and partner organisations around hate crime involved. And there's a study in there about the work that was done with resources for autism and barnet men cap. We have 20 professionals and volunteers attend that. So that's positive and we'll continue rolling those out. There's some case studies in there from victims, and I think what they're doing is highlighting the courses that we are running for victims and survivors, that they're having an impact, that they're helping women feel safer and to develop confidence to hopefully not go in to stay safe from abusive relationships and hopefully not repeat those cycles of victimisation. So we've invited SOLIS because the reduction in referrals, and we've also seen a reduction in the uptake. So the number of women or victims that have referred to SOLIS for help and support, there's a larger percentage in this quarter of cases being declined, and we're curious about why that is. So we're inviting them to come to the quarter two, that will be reported in quarter two. They'll be coming to the next board to help us understand the rationale behind their decision making for referrals. Good to note that we've had a fourth Barnet Refuge open. It's been opened by the Iranian Kurdish Women's Rights Organisation, has eight bed spaces for single Middle Eastern, North African and Afghan women who are fleeing domestic abuse. So really positive to see that additional resource in the borough. And I think the one-stop shop, we're still seeing good multi-agency working through the one-stop shop, and we're still seeing good footfall through that service. We can see that the links to housing, the links to temporary accommodation, I think they're a bit of a challenge. I don't think we have housing colleagues here today, but that's a bit of a challenge because lots of women who are fleeing domestic abuse want to leave, want to stay in the local area, and we don't have properties in the area to enable them to stay. I feel like we should all stand up for something. So we're working with housing to have a look at how we can determine priority around those women and children that need to stay in the borough, and those that could move out of the borough. But we're also considering ideas around perpetrators leaving the property and making sure that they're the ones that are going to TA rather than children, causing more disruption. Okay, so the perpetrator programme, so the CIFA programme, we've only got funding until, it's been very successful in rolling that out across the other ten boroughs, really good partnership working there. Unfortunately, we don't have agreement for funding beyond March 2025 at this point, so it will be a shame to lose that provision. It's really making a difference, and every time we hear from perpetrators who are using the programme, they give such strong and positive feedback about the way that it's considering domestic abuse in a cultural context. So we hope after the autumn budget statement that we might get some news on potential funding for next year, but maybe I'm being optimistic. So you can see here in the report that the volume of domestic violence prevention notices and domestic violence prevention orders that have been granted, and the number of Claire's law disclosures and outcomes, and that's on a steady pace. As you know, we've launched the Safe Haven pilot in March, and we are now at the point of review, so that's been live for six months now, so we're having a review of how that's working, so we're linking with those three premises that have the Safe Haven tools and stickers to look at what impact that's having, whether people are aware of what it is, and whether people are using it, and whether there's a need for us to roll that out in certain premises across the rest of the borough. So that's happening now, that review. Any questions on domestic abuse involved before I move on to reducing offending? Sorry, if I could just say a couple of things. One is I think it would be really helpful for councillors to understand, with solace, and why certain things aren't being progressed. Sorry, I know myself, I refer residents there, so I think that would be really helpful to have some sort of communication back on that. In terms of the Safe Haven assessment, I think we agreed that we'd do that through the winter period, because we think that there might be more take-up starting to happen as it gets darker earlier. In terms of CIFA, the administration very strongly supports its continuation, and if there's any sort of letter or communication you need from the chair, I'm very happy to do that. And lastly, I would suggest maybe Barnet Homes, when they're next here, if they can give us an update on how the accreditation process is going. I think it would be helpful if we could note that. Yep, thank you very much. Does anyone have any questions or comments on this section? No? Okay, thank you. So, just on to reducing offendings. In similarity, the Youth Justice Plan also does feel like a good time to be updating strategies at the moment, so the Youth Justice Plan is, we've just produced our annual report for last year, that was taken to the Overview and Scrutiny Committee, and we are now working on developing our Youth Justice Plan for 2025 to 2026 or 7, and that will be in production, it will need to go to full council for sign-off next year, so we'll be working with partners to develop that. So we're in Year 2 of our current strategy and this report provides an update on quarter one. I mean, it's all pretty positive in as much as Barnet's first-time entry rates is lower than London and the national averages, reoffending rates are lower than London and the national averages, and our custody rates are also lower. So the Barnet Youth Offending Service is doing a pretty good job on supporting young people to stay out of the criminal justice system through their out-of-court disposals and prevention programmes, and also to make sure that when those young people are coming into the system, that we reduce the risk of recidivism for those young people. So, yeah, it's a pretty positive story. So, in the quarter one Youth Justice Management Board, we focused on tackling disproportionality. It's acknowledged that we have disproportionality in our Youth Justice cohort. You can see from the data that we've got on page 18, which is about the young people's arrest and disposal statistics, and overwhelmingly we see a larger proportion of young black males. The stop and search is starting to improve, those numbers are going down, but the arrest is still higher. What we don't understand is what happens at charge, so we can't see if there's disparity at the charging point, so we know that we have more young black people arrested, but do they get the same outcomes at the point of charging? So we've asked the Youth Justice Police to help us try and understand that picture a little bit clearer, but we can see through the report that they are more likely to be charged for an offence, and less likely to be handed down an out-of-court disposal, so we do know that, but what we can't see is the tariff of offending, so we can't see whether black boys are just being arrested for more serious crimes, and therefore are not appropriate for out-of-court disposals, so that's a further piece of work that the Youth Justice Board and partners will be completing. So we know already we've tackled, we've spent a lot of time as a partnership tackling exclusions of black boys from education, and we've been able to bring that number down, so we knew back in 2021 when we started this work that black boys were more than twice as likely to have an exclusion than white children in Barnet schools, and as a local authority, Barnet had a higher rate of exclusions of black boys than other boroughs in north London, so we've had a tackling disproportionality groups tackle that, and we've reduced that, so it feels more balanced now, although we're seeing different children now being subject to exclusion, so we're keeping an eye on those particular groups, and suspensions, and that's part of the work that Chris is doing with schools as well, to have a look at those young people who are being suspended but not permanently excluded. We're also focused on our young people who are not in education, employment and training, and when we looked at our cohort, we could see of our need, the not education, employment training cohort, 66% of them were male, and 58% of them were from black and other minority ethnic groups, so we've got disparity and disproportionality in that group as well, so we can see it right through the youth justice system. Similarly, transfers to probation, 80% of the boys, they were all boys that were transferred in the year to June 2024, 80% of them were from black and other minority backgrounds, and what we don't yet understand is at what point were they arrested and what charges they had, and what was the kind of trigger for transferring to probation, so we need to just understand some of that detail a little bit clearer. Just to let you know that we have a, there's a Pan London stop and search pilot, it was launched in Haringey as a pilot about a year or so ago, Haringey council worked with the police and they dip sampled groups of children who were subject to stop and search to identify vulnerabilities in that particular group. We don't ordinarily, hadn't ordinarily received police notifications for children that are subject to stop and search, and what that audit found was that the children, some of these children were children that were in care, that had additional vulnerabilities, and the systems around those children were not being informed about these incidents, which meant that support couldn't be given to those children, so together with the police and Haringey they've launched a campaign across London, so it's now a Pan London pilot, and Barnet alongside colleagues across London are going to be doing dip sample or dips on our own stop and search children, and feed into that wider piece of work, and hopefully that will create a national change. I do have a question about that, but, and also the proportionality of it, and as long as, I know you're looking at it from, in terms of ethnic background, race, are you also looking at it in the context of disability, so I'm thinking about diverse, neurodiversity and mental health? The Haringey findings showed that there was a disproportionate number of children with SCN, EHCP, so there are vulnerabilities in this cohort of children, but we also know that the children that are in the justice system are similarly, they're over represented if they've got EHCP, so social communication difficulties in particular, so yeah. So we'll let you know how that goes, so we're just starting that now, and that's being led by Di Dave La Riviere and Cezanne from our youth justice team, so they're representing us in that piece of work. Tina, can I suggest maybe they come to a future board meeting to present on that at an appropriate time, I think would be good, because that would follow on from the report that you did last year, so do you want to, yeah, go ahead Ray. Thanks Chair, I just wanted to ask Tina, because I know we've asked before about the numbers of autistic young people that you might be, the teams might be working with, and the issues they face, I mean that's something we're keen on, both from the safeguarding adult board's point of view and developing the autism strategy, and I was just wondering if somebody perhaps could come to the access to justice subgroup where we could go through that in more detail, I think it would be really helpful, we've got one in early December, and I suppose I'd be keen especially to be looking at the pathways we've got from either autistic people who are offending, autistic people who are victims of crime, and what pathways have we got to support another working well, because there's a lot of support out there, it's just making sure that those pathways are working effectively, so if we could get somebody down to the access to justice group in December that would be great, thanks. It might be something that our clinical, we've got a clinical psychologist in the team and she's working largely with that, so I'll, please send me the dates and I'll forward the invite to her, and if she can't come I'm sure somebody else from the team will. So we also had a look at our restorative justice and victims programmes, that's been working really, really well, so we're working with young people to help them make reparations for their crimes and make contact with victims and write letters of apology and or meet with victims to, so we're holding restorative conferencing, so we're having, interestingly, a number of victims don't want to engage in that process, but the young people are being encouraged to write those letters even if the victims don't want to receive them, so that they are thinking about the consequences of their actions and the impact that their crimes have on the victims, so that's been a positive piece of work. We've got lots of young people involved in community reparation and we've had five new sites set up in Quarter 1, so we've got Edgware, Library, Little Village, Second Chance, Chipping and Osage Libraries are now sites for our young people to get involved, and we're giving young people AQA certificates, so that's recognised as part of their achievements as well, which has been really positive. We've given 112 of AQA certificates in Quarter 1, so lots of certificates being given out. Okay, so there's some stuff around, some online materials that have been published, and there's a link for you to have a look at that, and we'll report in Quarter 2 on the Youth Justice Residential, another successful residential in Surrey, I think we were this time, but that was really positive, and we've been working with an Olympian, BMEXA, who's been delivering a programme in the borough, him and his brothers and his father run a company now, teaching track racing skills, and it's focused on black young boys. That's been really positively received, so we hope we can continue that partnership if we have available funding. So the last part is on the Integrated Offender Management and the Reducing Offending Delivery Group, so the IOM, the stats are all reported within the report. We've been looking at the transition for young people, recognising, and we were talking about this in this Youth Justice Matters Board that we just had yesterday, there's definitely a gap between young people coming out of the youth justice system and then something happens in those intervening years before they end up in IOM, where they're now persistent, violent, prolific offenders, so we don't know what's happening in that space for those young people because there's not many services connected to them post-18. So we're trying to understand how we can make that better for those young adults. So we can see that in Quarter 4, we didn't have the Quarter 1 data for this year, but in Quarter 4 we saw violence moving to the top of the offences for IOM, which had taken over from theft in Quarter 3, but as expected, drugs, weapons, robbery are all in those top five categories. Okay, so I think that's all from me on this one. Thank you. Any questions? Thank you very much. Are there any questions at all? Any further? No? Great, thank you. So that's for noting. And then we move on to Item 10, which is Update to Serious Violence Duty and Violence Reduction Plan, which Chris Kelly is going to take us through. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Again, I would refer my colleagues and yourself, Chair, to the report and also the Violence Reduction Plan that's contained within the documents. I thought it'd be helpful just to highlight some key achievements, really, and kind of key outputs that we've seen over the last quarter. So starting kind of on Page 5, under Governance, we continue to have a really strong partnership arrangements to join up, both strategically and also operationally as well. Very much it's evidenced through the various panels and also strategic groups in terms of TTCG, MACE, CS MARAC, and also problem-solving groups as well, which really seeks to establish a understanding of the presenting needs and themes that are emerging and then also around kind of the actions in terms of mitigating risk around violence and also exploitation as well. A regularly distributing information in terms of our key partners as well in a proportionate way, support awareness, raising kind of the outward focus in terms of our partners understanding the local issues within communities and things as well, and also then being really kind of clear in terms of how they can raise further concerns that either, for example, their schools or various groups and young people that are raising know where to report back to. In terms of analysis and enforcement, we have a range of obviously police-led operations to address kind of localised needs. Again, a lot of that is identified through the partnership and governance arrangements that we have around kind of strategic meetings and also operational meetings as well. We've obviously heard from MPS colleagues around some of the successes that they've had over the last quarter around the reduction of violence against the persons, which has seen an 11% decrease, and also in terms of a decrease of violence against persons with injury as well. We have seen during call to soup one, which has already been discussed and highlighted, an increase around kind of knife crime offences, but that is not in relation to injury, and we feel that that is really just a potential impact of the increased operations and presence that we have within the communities at the moment. So we are very kind of keen in terms of targeting kind of areas that we are aware of that are linked in relation to kind of violence and things, and one of the things that we are doing in relation to that is obviously then triangulating and galvanising our outreach programmes and also our My Ends project when it comes online and also the Safer Schools Robbery Safety Initiative as well. We will see kind of increased activity in call to two around Project HADR as well, which again is predominantly a police-led but is also a partnership initiative as well, which will look at kind of a holistic way in which drugs are being tackled and also the associated crimes as well, so that would be something that would be reported back on in terms of next quarter. In terms of reducing access to weapons, we continue to work with our Barnet Education and Learning Service to track excluded and suspended young people, certainly where there has been some indications around either kind of weapons carrying or violence within the context of schools as well, and really kind of one of the things that leads to is targeting around their Restorative Justice hub and coordinating them will go into the schools and try to work with them in relation to pulling around kind of restorative conversations with young people, and also that it then leads to additional development around training, workforce development and stuff like that as well. What we've seen around our Restorative Justice over the last quarter is that they've gone into four schools with a total of 102 participants that have been involved in training, and at the moment what's happened is that that has then resulted in them actually taking on kind of more of a restorative conversations between people, between staff members and also young people as well, and then looking at kind of some forms of mediation and restorative meetings in relation to that as well. In terms of our outreach and detached, so looking at the activity which is occurring around that, during quarter one we've had 67 sessions where we've had our outreach workers that have been targeting and being present within our communities. That's totaled 201 hours of delivery, and during that time we have reached 186 young people, and we're finding, similar to the previous year really, that the majority of engagement is with males, so that's around 56% certainly during quarter one, and that the primary age group that we appear to be engaging with and that are also receptive in relation to engagement is around that 12 to 15 age group as well, which we're quite positive around as it offers potential diversionary work, especially when you look at the strategic needs assessment and actually our higher range cohort in terms of violence and stuff tends to be class 18 as well, so we're hoping that it will lead to diversionary work in relation to that. Some of the themes that emerged from the outreach work obviously get reflected back in terms of the governance arrangements and the range of meetings that we have, so examples of that is around of course CS MARAC and strategic base, and one of the positives that have come out from that as well is that we have found an unusual and unexpected theme of young people actually expressing an interest to becoming peer mentors and also becoming outreach workers themselves, which has been really, really good. So what we are really excited about is that that dovetails really beautifully into our Mayans projects, which will be coming online certainly in quarter two, which will then look at developing peer mentors and also kind of helping expand the outreach program as well, so we will have some continuity around the delivery of that over the course of the next year. Is that the project with Arts Against Knives as well? It is indeed, yeah. So I think coming from a background in the youth sector that that is really, really welcome in terms of young people being able to step forward and encourage others is fantastic, thanks. I just wanted to check it was that project, thank you. So the other part, just to link to that as well, is that our after school safety initiative projects, which is looking at tackling kind of localised robberies, certainly within our transport hubs, we have started to mobilise and come online in relation to that during quarter one through our partnership with NPS. So that has been through the marking of mobile phones, we've begun to get in contact and be present within our schools as well, and also to raise awareness around that. And we've just appointed the two workers that will then be mobilised to actually be providing the community safety aspect and then also around the outreach aspect within our transport hubs, and it's expected they will start in quarter two. So working with our communities, we continue to deliver around our contextual training. So that is both to our VCS partners, grassroots organisations, as well as partners as well, and that we also continue to have a substantial and comprehensive wraparound in terms of when serious incidents do occur. So what we are able to do is look at attending and facilitating a range of community impact meetings where there have been incidents of violence, and to then be looking at coordinating the input through our violent integrated clinical service, and then also any other support charities, businesses that can potentially help support around the collective and individual kind of trauma and emotional impact around that. In terms of building on the victim's care hub, quarter one had seen a total of 54 referrals, which is forecast to be well over what we had intended to deliver, and clearly there is a significant demand in relation to the victim's care hub. We're seeing that the type of referrals are really coming from a range of different partners, but children and young people services, of course, community safety, police, and we're really focused at the moment on promoting greater awareness around the victim's care hub in terms of housing colleagues as well, and that's because there's been a range of coordinating meetings over quarter one, which has kind of indicated vulnerability of housing tenants, which has then resulted in coordinated activity, and we want to make sure that there is a comprehensive support there for the victim as well. Just I made a referral myself last week, and that was something I was fortunate to go on a ride along with the police response team, and so I think it would be helpful to join up there, actually, for some of those cases to increase awareness of the support hub, because it proved very useful, and it was very useful to be able to offer that support. Thank you, Councillor. I'll make sure that it's prioritised. Thank you, and also, you know, thanks to the team, both on restorative justice and the victim support hub, who responded incredibly quickly to that. Thank you. In terms of kind of the nature of the referrals, we find that the majority of referrals are around crime prevention, in terms of kind of general things, and then the next area which we are seeing quite significant demand on is in relation to victims of common assault and also knife crime as well, and then around exploitation, so specifically around criminal exploitation. We see, in terms of the breakdown around those 54 referrals, 34 of those were adults, 24 of those were children, and again, we're seeing more males that are engaging in the context of that service and stuff as well, so 32 males which we were working with in terms of victims. And I'll hold there for any questions from colleagues. I guess just an observation for me, I know the duty kind of goes up to 25 in terms of interventions. I noticed that a lot of the kind of outreach work, diversionary work, kind of stopped at 18, and just in the kind of language, it's around kind of young people. I'm kind of wondering what focus we have as an authority around young adults and those 18 to 25s, particularly around, you talked a lot about the kind of educational piece, how far are we into FE colleges and to some degree, some universities where people are coming in with that kind of serious violence piece post 18. So in terms of restorative justice, we have begun to work with Middlesex University and that we do have existing links in terms of Barnett and Southgate as well. What I was going to say, with the outreach side of things, it's really interesting because the project is actually scoped to be working with also and engaging with young adults up to the age 25 as well, and we continue to try and engage with our plus 18 cohorts when out and about. And there is a reluctance in relation to that, however, the workers are continuing and they are absolutely aware that they need to continue to try and engage in terms of that age group. So I guess how do we, from a probation service, we're dealing with those adults, how do we engage in that process and ensure that our young people know that these services exist locally? Sorry, could you repeat that just a second? That's okay. So from a probation perspective, where we're often working with these young people as both perpetrators and victims, how do we ensure that we can promote the accessibility to those services locally? So I think that it's around making sure that there's an awareness within probation in terms of what services and local services are around. What we can do is that there is kind of a community directory which has been pulled around as part of the needs assessment for the serious violence duty as well, which outlines a range of kind of youth provisions that were focused around supporting young people, around awareness of weapons and violence and things as well. That can absolutely be shared and I can ping the crossover to your workers and things as well. The other thing as well with that is that we also try to ensure that kind of the adults risk panel is coordinating some of that activity for also those young adults and things that we're worried about in terms of violence as well. And my final question Chris, sorry to be pleased to know, will the kind of intervention such as that kind of peer mentoring that you've talked about be available to that 80s/25 cohort as well? So we are really kind of focused in terms of looking at trying to expand on universal offers around mentoring for that older age group. At the moment there is a bit of a gap as kind of highlighted by Tina around the IOM cohort as well, post 18 to them becoming a little bit older and that's something that we're really focused on in terms of looking at what potential opportunities there are in terms of funding and projects and around also how we can effectively engage and help continue to promote different trajectories for that group as well. Thank you and it does sound like an area for future work for co-production with young people as well and I can see Tina's got a hand up and there might be more we want to pick up in the private bit of the meeting as well, thank you. I'm just thinking Karim that when we get information about London Crime Prevention Fund because the ex-offender mentoring service that we have that's attached to the IOM that's funded through the London Crime Prevention Fund and we haven't yet, correct me if I'm wrong Matt, we haven't yet had any requests, we haven't been given the amount that we've got available to us for the next three years yet and all of that funding is part of that funding suite that runs out in March 25, but when and if we get an invitation to set out what we'd like to deliver over the next three years we could certainly, I think because we know that we've got this gap that we could extend that programme to younger probation cohorts, so young adult cohort that's open to probation, not just specifically IOM. Yeah because IOM is only 25% of the young people on IOM and they are a specific group of individuals that actually get a lot of support in other areas anyway, but I'm thinking more broadly about the generic caseload as you've highlighted and we do have loads of young adults on our caseload that are not IOM. I think it's something we definitely need to look closer into together and with certain local partners as well. I think Matt wants to say something, thanks. Yeah, chair, unfortunately we received apologies from Alice Bird from MOPAC for this meeting, the two items that I was hoping Alice could give us an update on, I've chased it in the background via email, is number one, Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London is currently out to local authorities consulting on the police and crime plan that has to be published by the 31st of March of next year, 2025, in previous funding streams for the local crime prevention fund, which is the sole money that is being referred to in this matter, we were given quite short notice for submission of bids, which Chris and I completed, so what I've asked is, number one, could we try if possible please and have some kind of earlier prior notice so we can bring it to elected members and colleagues to determine what we would like to propose to use that funding for and two, could you try and indicate as best as you can, allowing for the current circumstances nationally, what that funding, grant funding offer is likely to be and what you would wish for, excuse me, London and specifically Barnet local authorities to seek to invest in and what would be your running time for that. The problem that we have with grant funding, especially from grant funding streams such as MOPAC is, it's often decided in quite short notice for those agencies or those services to then make that grant submission, so we can plan but we can't predict and that is a vulnerability for us from the work streams that we're doing already. Having said that, we've put that representation in, I've asked Alice via email yesterday, okay you can't come, could you please try and give us some kind of indication and I'll carry that on as a piece in the background and obviously brief, Claire and Dec according. Very much so, I'd also like to note just how well the relationship between the different departments in the council is working, particularly the two of you and the bids that have come through this year, I'm aware that it's a healthy challenge that we all give ourselves in the way things are constructed in Barnet and I think it's very welcome. I also have squibbled a note myself on the MOPAC issue, I'm very happy to take that up, we're very happy to take that up as an administration and if there's any appropriate meetings, letters etc, we can have a chat afterwards about that, thank you. I didn't have anything else to add, Councillor. Thank you very much, that was really detailed and obviously a very important area of work for everybody and thank you for the questions as well, so we note that and we move on to item 11 which is the hate crime update, thank you. Thank you very much. I hope you've always had an opportunity to read the report, I'm sure you're very aware of what's been happening nationally with the riots, all of which mostly was driven by fake news, misinformation. We've seen a rise of over 200% in anti-Semitism in Barnet alone since the October conflict that began last year and one third of all anti-Semitism across London happens in Barnet as well, so we've got together things, there's a focus, we need to be focusing on community cohesion. One of those areas I think is tackling hate crimes, so together with Councillor Conway, the comms team, myself, lots of different areas across the local authority, we've been looking at how can we in some way drive or tackle hate crime. This report really just brings together what we're doing currently and this is just the start, there's lots of things happening in the future, we've got the Hate Crime Awareness Week coming up in October, there is a comms campaign will be starting right on the back of that, we also have a Hate Crime Summit that is also planned for early October and really I just want to highlight some of the areas in here, some of the things we're doing at the moment across the local authority, the community safety team, one of the priorities is access to justice for people who are victims of hate crime really just to ensure that people feel comfortable and confident in reporting their hate crimes. Myself, the hate crime lead obviously and I do a lot of work with schools, early intervention, classroom settings, bullying, discrimination, resilience about hatred, online we have lots of funding come from the SCF now, lots of the shared endeavour funding which has seen a lot of organisations and I hope at the next meeting I have some outcomes of those deliveries, many of that, much of that, in fact not all of it, is happening within schools looking at anti-discrimination, hate crime, online resilience, critical thinking, that kind of thing, the task and finish group I think I've just mentioned and we will have a bit more information on that comms update I believe a bit later on, we've got someone from comms going to give a bit more detail about that summit and the campaign. We have the Hate Crime Awareness Campaign at the beginning, the Community Capacity Project that has just finished, I'm hoping to have some outcomes from that as well, obviously we have Ray representing, Mencap here as well with the Zero Tolerance to Hate Crime Projects and I think you might be given a quick update when I finish this, is that ok? I know we've got a great opportunity there now, Fayez is doing absolute wonders at Mencap there. We have the Family Services as well, the Resources Toolkit that Tina shared with us at an earlier meeting that I've been sharing with schools and other professionals, etc, etc. With our partners, the police as well, there's a lot of focus I think on some of those events that are tied to the Palestine and Israel conflict as well, Michael Buckley as well, we've been very much engaged with local authority, with Ray, with Fayez, with the comms team really so we can just work together to drive and tackle this head on. There's a Why Me campaign video, there's a new video for immigrants or unaccompanied young people, it's just been launched as well, 22 local authorities have come together to put that together, one of those videos focuses on, in over 100 languages, focuses on the justice system as well, so we're hoping that people have the confidence to come forward, report more so we can understand a lot more. The Safer Spaces Scheme as well, again another thing that has been driven by the community, the zero project, zero tolerance to hate crime projects, and really just going forward, this is not where it stops, this is where it starts, anyone who has any thoughts or comments or suggestions of how we can improve reporting more than anything else, we know that hate crime isn't one of the massively unreported crimes, any way we can ease that, we're looking at maybe expanding the reporting centres, a couple of mosques I think are interested in opening or at least developing some hate crime reporting there, I do believe I think Islamophobia, I mean Barney is very much underreported as well, so anyone, we're always open to suggestions, ideas, input, engagement, anything that can help us improve. Yes? It's not an idea that came from me, but we ran a focus group with our sleepers a couple of weeks ago, and they commented that in response to the Southport incident that led to a large rise across everyone, including in Barnet, in potential risks, everything closed and they were left really very vulnerable with nowhere to go, and asked that in future if you're doing emergency planning, that actually those who are sleeping in our borough feature into that, because they felt very vulnerable, left without any access to services, so I said I'd raise it here. Okay, so what group was that in particular? That's individuals who are sleeping rough in the borough. Okay, homeless, yes, very good point, very good point as well, and I think to be aware as well, we do have five hotels in Barnet that are housing asylum seekers, and much of the rights happening around the country, I mean, I say isolated, there were isolated incidents last year on a much smaller scale where people turned up in the hundreds, you know, angry, and because of fake news, you know, they're living five-star lifestyles while we are freezing or living on the streets, so yes, certainly homeless people, thank you. Fiona, I think if you could put that in writing as well, that would be really helpful, because what we're trying to do collectively is to start a conversation with all communities on this, so that the summit that's been proposed by officers that we're bringing together covers a range of different people coming to that first meeting, there will also be an opportunity for a discussion online, and the whole idea is that we start this conversation this October to co-produce with our communities where we go on this together. What has come very strongly as well, because my portfolio covers, and we deliberately constructed it like this, community safety and resident participation, so there's been a whole programme of round tables that we've been doing anyway through the year, as well as the leader listens, etc., and so there's a very keen sense from local communities, not that we just don't just look at hate crime, but that we look at community cohesion and we actually celebrate, highlight, extend the initiatives that run anyway across our borough, and I think I will always be this balancing voice, but I think the response in Finchley from meeting with the local communities, from the fact that it was possible for the multi-faith forum to go in collectively and address Friday prayers, all of the informal outreach that's happened, the support for asylum seekers locally, etc., we're not complacent, but it has been extraordinary and very encouraging alongside the very difficult figures and time that it has been for communities in this borough. I will do that, I will set out, because actually the people we spoke with were very complimentary about other aspects of support as well that they do see and can access, it was just that specific gap, and they understood, they understood why libraries closed, why everyone closed, because of safety issues, it's just they wanted to ensure that in future, so no, I'll do a summary of that whole discussion actually and fold it onto you so you can include that in the future. That would be really helpful, because there's obviously homeless action in various people and places, okay, came to mind as somewhere that we could do separate listening and discussions with. I'm also conscious that the police after that whole operation sent us all as partners, what do you think was missing, what could we do differently, I think we all operate a learning by doing approach as well, and are always interested in knowing what is and isn't working, which is part of this as well, is to look at how we kind of review things, keep things different, work with communities going forward, so thank you. I wanted to give a specific update really on the zero tolerance to hate crime part of things, because we have had a problem over the last year in that we did have a vacant pulse for about six months, so that did impact on the project. What we've done now is we've filled it, we've filled it temporarily, now we've just filled it permanently and someone's about to start. Where I'd say it's caused particular problems is that it meant we haven't had the programme of training and workshops, and there's been less support for the hate crime reporting census, and that's certainly I'd say impacted on the number of reports, so that's one of the things that we need to catch up on now, we've got people backing the post, and I'd say the census especially we use in the hate crime week as a way to kind of reinvigorate them. I think there's things they can do during the week that would promote themselves both to their own staff and to other users as well, so it has been a difficult period, and we do appreciate itself as being a time when hate crime has been very much to the fore, but we're ready to catch up now. Thank you. That's very welcome to hear because part of it is to refresh what was there before in terms of the hate champions network and newsletter and all of that kind of thing. I think a lot of people stand ready to help and to be part of something very positive locally, so that's great. I think I now need to read out, I don't need to read out the whole thing, thanks, that's a great relief to everybody, so we're just noting the recommendations and thanking everybody. That takes us on to item 12 which is the combatting drugs partnership update. I would note that in this area we try to work very closely together, we also operate learning by doing. I think the addition of Project Adda to the borough this year is making a really welcome contribution as well. Are we starting with Councilor Moore? I don't mind, but thank you both for being here, and Louisa as well who I think is online and we wish you well. Thanks. Thank you Chair. I will just introduce Louisa who will present the report and to highlight it is an annual report, an update, but also presenting the new structure of the combatting drugs partnership board for your information and noting how we'll continue working. And I'll hand over to Louisa, I hope she's feeling better today. Thank you very much Louisa and for joining us despite not being well which is really appreciated. I think the new structure is very welcome because I know when we've been at meetings it has often felt like there isn't enough time to discuss in depth certain things. I think one thing I would add is Operation Woodson which has been underway this year in Buntoke and the very close working relationship and cooperation between the police, community safety, youth outreach and Change Grow Live with very clear offer of support as well as enforcement going on there which I think is really appreciated by everyone and actually has had several conversations with communities locally about that as well so I think it's a wider education piece that happens. I think Councilor Moore would like to add something as well, thank you. I just wanted to firstly start by thanking all the officers both within the council and actually across partners because while we haven't had absolutely consistent presence at our board meetings, actually we really have done quite well compared with some of our other borough authorities in terms of getting partners around the table and it spans right the way across council departments such as public health and children's and family services. Housing very importantly have been engaging but the reality is that they're formal meetings and the real meat of the work goes on through those relationships that are built outside those formal meetings so I absolutely do support the reduction of the formal meetings to two a year. I was very clear though that they needed to be aligned with the schedules of dates for Health and Wellbeing Board and Safe Community Partnership Board because this is the public and transparent reporting of that work that we are able to report in public and it's also really important that timing gives input to strategic decision making by those two boards as well. So I support it but I want to make sure that that's aligned and also enjoy partners to really pick up the baton in terms of leading on that work. You've talked around the table today about some really good working across departments within and beyond the council, across police, with probation and a range of others and so I think it's another case where it's very much more than the sum of the parts and so it's about making use of the resources, sometimes scarce that we have, making sure it's targeted into the right place to get the very best for our local residents, particularly those who are struggling to get their lives back on track. Thanks very much. I should note also I bumped into Change Grow Live yesterday as well while I was out and about and spoke to them about working with us possibly as volunteers with a listening session around the development of the VORG and DA strategy that actually came from them and a chat and an offer so I was going to bring that up too. I think Claire's got something you'd like to add, thank you. Thank you Chair. Thanks, it's really good to see an update on how the partnership is working and all of the results. I know various colleagues around the table are involved in. With regards to the new structure, I think it looks like a really good structure going forward. I'd just like to add that we probably need to add in the overview and scrutiny on the top level of that chart because we have Crime and Disorder overview and scrutiny annually in the summer and last year Louisa did attend with an update from the Combat and Drugs Partnership so in terms of absolute oversight it would kind of feed into that, that sits across health and wellbeing board and to the Community Safety Partnership. It's a challenge I think, that's obviously very sensible. Thank you very much. I know we all sit in a lot of meetings but there is a really strong collaborative approach here across partners and all officers and it's really very welcome. Councillor Warren? If I might just, I should have said it when I was thanking officers, actually just a recognition that some of the work has been presented at Pan London and wider bodies as well so there is broader recognition of some of the work that's going on, particularly with young people. Great, thank you. So we note that as in the report and then we move on to our final item which is safety in parts. I would like to note two things here just before I hand over to Cassie. One is that this actually came from a comment originally from Overview and Scrutiny Committee who were wanting to see some, I think they were looking at they were going to do some stuff on parts but actually it worked with work we wanted to do so that link is really important and the dialogue with all councillors and I'd also like to thank my colleague Councillor Schneiderman for his work and his input on this because a cabinet system enables us to work very collaboratively as a team as well so that's really appreciated too. Thank you Cassie. Thank you Cassie. I think also to pick up on what you said about the volunteering groups and the incredible way in which residents sort of are active in our green spaces. I think often when I'm asked what do you mean by resident participation, it's very much how residents choose to engage and I think some of the way people feel safer certainly from having been on sort of some of the Friends litter picks and all of that sort of stuff in Burntoke and wider is because they're going together and there's a sense of community that you know something that starts as a litter pick transforms into something completely different with the connections locally which is really wonderful to see and I think there's been such a growth in that in the past few years in the borough. I've not been to the green spaces forum actually for a while so if it's helpful to sort of go to that, that was a meeting I used to go to quite a bit so if you'd like me to go okay in this sort of role that would be great. I don't know if anyone's got any questions or comments. Lots here, go ahead. Thanks chair, thanks Cassie. It's been a really detailed piece of work so thanks very much for coordinating it and everybody that's been involved. The one thing I just wasn't sure which I just wanted to check for clarity really which isn't included in the report necessarily or the recommendations but we have spoken about it previously was around where we've got venues in parks such as cafes etc etc just looking at what the leases or contracts that we have so if for example they you know the operating hours whether there's antisocial behaviour or any safety concerns linked with a venue what kind of conditions we have and I know that you said that would be a wider review I just didn't want to lose it in this piece of work. Thank you, I think that would be great because also once I understand what you're saying and I've had conversations myself with the estates team at points it's also very much about protecting the people that are taking those leases on as well so it's not just a prohibitive thing it's there to try and keep everybody safer and I think in certain situations would be very welcome. Declan. Thank you chair, just very quickly to mention that one of the big issues that we had and we were trying to work through was the public's perception of safety in the parks because it doesn't necessarily mean that parks are unsafe it's just that they feel unsafe or look unsafe and that's what the feel is. As you know we're working on patrols etc which will help with that high visibility presence we've got a couple of high visibility vans coming on board within the next couple of weeks yes that's right and that's coming away that will obviously feed into the results of what's going on and we'll keep Tabs and keep Cassie involved with that and how we're doing that and just to add that our police colleagues are also involved with the parks because they use our PSPO tickets as well so they're out there and this is all hopefully going to add to the perception of the parks being a much safer place. I think I'll just add as well that the reason we brought in a PSPO across the borough and the provisions there was very much from listening to residents on doorsteps across the borough and in the parks too so it's you know it's something that was developed very much with an item to all of that. I'm sure we'll be hearing more about the vehicles that are coming soon to our parks I know that's been a very long-term project by the council as well thank you very much Cassie to you Matt and all the team for your work on this thank you so we note that report. The forward work programme I don't know if anybody's got anything oh sorry Fiona just the safeguarding adults board annual review will need to be probably at the next meeting if that's at all possible just because then I'll be able to present it that's November the 29th yep could you send us an email just so we pick that up yeah thank you that's great does anyone have any other business of course wow I'll just switch the mic two very quickly things of this too but I will be really brief what both good news I think first one initially when I started back in 2017 the police raised concerns that there wasn't a tiny appropriate adult service for adults obviously children and families pay for and support young people who are brought into custody but there's no legal requirement for anybody to do that for adults. MOPAC have finally agreed to fund it and it will start in January 2025 Ray and I are meeting with the lead to look at KPIs and what could be reported to locally around the impact and how that's working so hopefully that'd be really welcome news to your custody officers it's definitely welcome news for our client base because they're brought into custody they should get more timely support the other bit of news I thought I'm sorry I'm stealing your Thundergreen but I think it's I've heard some very good things about the SDS 40 release earlier this month I have and I thought it might be oh so the prison release that happened earlier and I thought so I just wondered if we could have I know that the London they're looking at are there lessons to be learned and to because obviously there's another release in October but generally I wondered if we could have the highlights to the next meeting or something thank you very much so that both welcome bits of good news of course we will be talking in the private bit of the meeting about how that first face has gone and lessons done because it's something we're keeping a very close eye on so I think that would need to be a discussion as to what it's possible to bring to the next meeting what it is and and other routes for sharing that but thank you for raising that that's great so the next meeting is on the 29th of September so November we're in September so right it's certainly very busy and we'll see everybody then and thank you all very much for the contributions and thank you to everyone online thank you thank you you you [ Silence ]

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