Agenda and minutes

Councillor Leslie Ayoola – other Council business

Councillor Corall Jenkins – non-Council business

Councillor Neghat Khan – non-Council business

Councillor Anne Peach – non-Council business

None.

To confirm the minutes of the meeting held on 6 January 2016

The minutes of the meeting held on 6 January 2016 were agreed as a correct record and signed by the Chair.

Report of the Head of Democratic Services

Tim Spink, Head of Nottingham Crime and Drugs Partnership (CDP) and Chief Superintendent Mike Manley, Commander for the City Division at Nottinghamshire Police, delivered a presentation to the Committee, providing an overview of the CDP Partnership Plan and an update on policing in Nottingham.

During the presentation the following information was highlighted:

(a)  Nottingham has made huge strides in recent years in reducing crime, anti-social behaviour and the factors that drive them, such as the misuse of drugs and alcohol. The CDP’s Partnership Plan was approved by Nottingham City Council in September 2015 and is coterminous with targets outlined by the Police and Crime Commissioner;

(b)  As part of the 2015-20 Plan, the CDP have outlined a number of headline targets, such as targeting a 20% reduction in victim-based crime by 2020, which they are currently on target to achieve, and increasing the rate of recovery from substance misuse dependency to 5% above the average for the Core Cities by 2020;

(c)  A 12 month baseline ending in July 2016 has been proposed to reduce victim-based crime by 20%. This is in order to mitigate the effect of a HMIC inspection into crime recording which has led to increased compliance of crime recording in Nottingham and across England and Wales;

(d)  Since a refresh of its ‘Most Similar Family’ comparator groups in October 2014, Nottingham has improved its position to its fifth highest rate of all crime and fifth highest rate of victim-based crime per 1,000 of the population which is the best population the city has ever achieved. Preston, Gateshead, Swansea and Leeds have been removed from the ‘Most Similar Family’ comparison group and replaced with Middlesbrough, Blackpool, Hastings and Wolverhampton;

(e)  The CDP target of successful completions as a proportion of all clients in treatment is 5% above the core cities average by 2020. Nottingham is currently exceeding this target, as well as the national rate and Nottinghamshire;

(f)  Anti-social behaviour is down 1% against 2014/15 baseline figures (recorded January 2015 – December 2015) and there were 115 fewer calls compared to 2014/15. There were a number of contributory factors impacting on the changing nature of anti-social behaviour, such as the diversion of Nottingham City Council calls to the Police’s 101 number;

(g)  The CDP’s Partnership approach for 2015/16 covers the following five themes: Anti-social behaviour, burglary, drug and alcohol misuse and other violence (described as all other violence that is not defined as ‘night-time economy’ or domestic violence related;

(h)  In delivering the Plan commitments, partners responsible for reducing crime, anti-social behaviour and substance misuse/reoffending in Nottingham will align with the PCC and City priorities, where possible. There have been successful examples of coordinated problem solving approaches in the City, such as solving issues around street drinking in the Arboretum and the development of a Begging Strategy.

Following questions and comments from the Committee, the following information was highlighted:

(i)  The Police are committed to high impact wards and have responded to those areas to address emerging challenges by moving a number of Police Community Support Officers (PCSO) into that area. It is not just about policing those areas of need in the City, but also the partnership work taking place with agencies and communities, such as Trading Standards to address tobacco issues;

(j)  The Police are faced with substantial savings this year amounting to £12 million and decision to withdraw funding to the Youth Offending Team (YOT) has not been taken lightly;

(k)  The allocation of Police staff in the city is flexible and is reviewed each week to ensure that the demands are being adequately met in all areas of the City;

(l)  The Police have not witnessed a substantial change in the level of confidence Nottingham people have in their service and although the Police do not always attend every crime it is important that citizens continue to report criminal activity. It is often useful for councillors to check with their Neighbourhood Teams to see if similar issues have been reported in the past and how they have been responded to;

(m)  Nottinghamshire Police faces a significant challenge in meeting the proposed level of cuts to its funding which will see a difference in the services that can be provided for particular types of crime, for example, Nottinghamshire Police conducts an increasing number of investigations over the telephone;

(n)  The nature of criminality is changing across the country and therefore the capability of police staff will need to reflect this. Discussions are taking place across the country about emerging crimes linked to cyber activity, such as fraud and sex offences. Although work is taking place to ensure that crime and prevention techniques are adapted to safeguard online protection, the technology industry must also recognise the emerging risks and look to prioritise these.

RESOLVED to thank the Crime and Drugs Partnership and Nottinghamshire Police for their informative presentation around the CDP Partnership Plan 2015 to 2020.

Report of the Head of Democratic Services

Nigel Cooke, Director of One Nottingham and Dean Goodburn, Policy Officer, delivered a presentation on the Nottingham Plan Annual Report 14/15 (Year 5) detailing progress against Nottingham Plan targets for 14/15. During the presentation, the following information was highlighted:

(a)  The Nottingham Plan is a 10 year partnership plan which is currently at the halfway stage of the plan to 2020. Commitment from partners and partnerships that help to deliver the plan is strong but there is recognition that there is still some way to go to ensure that all communities in Nottingham benefit from the achievements and aspirations set out in the Plan;

(b)  Just under half of the targets outlined in the Nottingham Plan are performing well, with a small percentage classed as “Amber” and a third of targets classed as “Red” or behind target. There has been an increase in the number of targets classed as red compared to preceding years, owing to the reclassification of poverty related targets as red, following the release of the Indices of Deprivation on 30 September 2015. In addition to this, there are some ambitious targets in relation to education and poverty, both of which have proved challenging;

(c)  There have been a number of key successes reported in the Plan such as the accelerated delivery of the Growth Plan and the government has committed £58.9 million through the Local Growth Fund for a range of priority projects that will support growth;

(d)  As well as the key successes reported in the Nottingham Plan, are number of areas have been identified for improvement. As a result of welfare reforms, the demand for emergency housing support has continued to rise. Although there has been little change in the levels of adult obesity (which is currently at 60.7%), Nottingham continues to experience high levels of alcohol-related hospital admission (954 per 100,000 population) which are significantly above the Core Cities average of 771 per 100,000 population;

(e)  Following the publication of the Indices of Deprivation, Nottingham is now ranked as the 8^th most deprived authority, a worse position that the previous rank in 2010 of 20^th most deprived authority. This is part explained by the London Boroughs that had dipped sharply in the recession bouncing back quickly, therefore nothing had taken place in Nottingham to influence this;   

(f)  In the future, the Plan will highlight key data in bite-size chunks. It would be appropriate for partner organisations to take charge of some of their pertinent areas and report back on outstanding or concerning areas;

(g)  To support this approach, the newly established Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee could focus on educational attainment and has already carried out some work on school exclusions.

RESOLVED to

(1)  thank Nigel Cooke and Dean Goodburn for their informative presentation on the Nottingham Plan 14/15 Annual Report;

(2)  include a review of Poverty Challenges in Nottingham (Nottingham Indices of Multiple Deprivation Results) on the Work Programme for 2016/17;

(3)  include a review of Educational Attainment levels in Nottingham on the Work Programme for the Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee for 2016/17;

(4)  refer the area of tackling health inequality to the Health Scrutiny Committee.

Report of the Head of Democratic Services

Rav Kalsi, Senior Governance Officer introduced the report of the Head of Democratic Services setting out the programme of activity for this Committee and the Overview and Scrutiny Review Panels for 2015/16.

RESOLVED to agree the work programme for the Overview and Scrutiny Committee and Review Panels for 2015/16, as summarised in the report.