Agenda and minutes

RESOLVED:  To note the attendance at this meeting of the following duly appointed Reserve Members:-

RESOLVED:  To note that no declarations were made by Members of the Committee.

That the minutes of the meeting held on 27 February 2018 be taken as read and signed as a correct record.

RESOLVED:  That the minutes of the meeting held on 27 February 2018 be taken as read and signed as a correct record.

To receive any public questions received in accordance with Committee Procedure Rule 17 (Part 4B of the Constitution).

Questions will be asked in the order in which they were received.  There will be a time limit of 15 minutes for the asking and answering of public questions.

[The deadline for receipt of public questions is 3.00 pm on 15 March 2018.  Questions should be sent to publicquestions@harrow.gov.uk   

No person may submit more than one question].

RESOLVED:  To note that no public questions or petitions were received at this meeting.

There were none.

Report of the Divisional Director, Strategic Commissioning

The Committee received a report Community Safety and Violence, Vulnerability and Exploitation Strategic Assessment, an annual review of the patterns of crime and anti-social behaviour in the Borough which fulfils partnership responsibilities under Sections 5, 6, and 7 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998.  The findings of the Strategic Assessment would help inform the annual refresh of Harrow’s Community Safety and Violence, Vulnerability and Exploitation Strategy. 

The Divisional Director, Strategic Commissioning, explained that efforts had been made to obtain and present information in a way which made year-on-year comparisons easier.  The document was being brought to the Committee at this stage so that it could be considered in advance of the report on the formal Community Safety and Violence, Vulnerability and Exploitation Strategy at its meeting in June.  The assessment reflected an overall increase in crime but Harrow was still the London borough with the lowest level of crime on a per capita basis.  The principal concern was the growing levels of violence involving young people.

A Member asked whether the information in the assessment document could be relied upon since he did not wish there to be uncertainties about baseline positions when trend information was considered at a later stage by the Committee.  He was also concerned that, in the context of the move to the three-borough “Borough Command Units” in the Metropolitan Police Service, it would be important to track trends in Harrow.  It was explained that there could be retrospective revisions of crime data when new information was released, but officers had gone to considerable lengths to use the most reliable sources.  It was acknowledged that this could complicate comparisons though this had to be balanced against the value of providing timely information.  These concerns and challenges had been encountered over a number of years now.   It was suggested that the local Police should “sign-off” the data provide so that it could form a more reliable baseline. 

Another Member expressed his concern over the level of aggregation in the data which he felt made it difficult to see the real impact in different areas and masked the distinctions between the wards in the Borough.  He wondered whether information was skewed by, for example, the reporting of crime at Harrow Police Station appearing as data for that ward when it actually reflected a broader impact.  It was explained that the information was largely based on data provided by the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) on a monthly basis.  While it would be possible to do further work on ward-level analysis, more detailed drilling-down would be difficult, requiring requests to MOPAC for additional data.  Officers would continue to liaise with them about this.

The Member was concerned that without proper analysis of the data at a detailed level, there was a risk that decisions would be made on Police officer allocations in an uniformed way and resources would not therefore be targeted to the areas of greatest need.  He considered that a “health warning” should be  ...  view the full minutes text for item 268.

Which cannot otherwise be dealt with.

The Chair of the Scrutiny Challenge Panel for the review of the Financing of the Regeneration Strategy reported on the presentation he and Councillor Anne Whitehead (representing the Panel’s Vice-Chair) gave to cabinet on 27 February 2018 on the finding and recommendations of the review.  He regretted that the Leader of the Council had not attended this final meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee of this Administration to address the issues. 

The Panel Chair wished to thanked all those involved in the review, especially Shumailla Dar of the Policy Unit, who had supported the work of Members.  He considered that the review would be very beneficial to the Council in taking the regeneration programme and he looked forward to the Council’s formal response following the election.  He also wished to thank Councillors Jerry Miles and Philip O’Dell for their work chairing the Overview and Scrutiny Committee since 2014.

The Chair thanked Members for their contribution to Overview and Scrutiny work.  He looked forward to further improvement to scrutiny processes building on the recommendations of the LGA Peer Review and the report of the Centre for Public Scrutiny.