Collaborative working: the UK experience

1. Collaborative working: the UK experience Chris Williams Head of Community Safety London Borough of Brent

2. Understanding the problem

3. Where we came from • Pre-2004: offenders released from prison supervised if prison sentence over 12 months • Prolific Priority Offenders programme: • Recognised small number of offenders did huge amount of crime • Supported on release, eg met at prison, access to drug treatment, help with benefits etc • Saw major decreases in reoffending

4. Integrated Offender Management • Taking PPO on: • Prevent and Deter • For younger prolific offenders • Catch and Convict • Targeting those still offending • Rehabilitate and Resettle • Longer term approach to tackling underlying causes

5. Holistic Approaches: R&R • Addressing the full needs of the offender: • Accommodation • Education, Employment, Training • Finance, Benefits and Debt • Attitudes and Behaviour • Health and Mental Health • Drugs and alcohol • Families and Children

6. Tackling groups, not people • People behave differently in a group • Groups carry the street code • Vendettas and rivalries • If group dynamic is causing the problem, we need to identify the groups and engage with them – not the individuals within • Doesn’t mean we don’t stop working with the individual!

7. A continuum?

8. Gang activity and drug markets • Organised Crime Groups/Urban Street Gangs have core business in drug supply • Identifying drug markets and disrupting them impacts on gang violence • Violence undertaken as method of control over business area – defending boundaries and intimidating users

9. Do you understand: • What drugs are being sold • How drugs are being sold • On street? Safe houses? In licensed premises? Through the homes of vulnerable people? • Who buys and sells drugs? • Network of suppliers – on behalf of….? • Casual users? Addicts? Age? • Where the drugs come from • Links to Organised Crime Groups • Where the drugs are being sold

10. OPEN DRUGS MARKET GANG AREAS OPEN DRUGS MARKET & GANG AREAS

11. What we’d like to do • Eliminate gangs • Enforcement • Prevention and intervention • Prevent gang offending • Stop gang recruitment • Separate gang members from gangs • “Solve the gang problem” • How likely is this?

12. Why what we traditionally do doesn’t’ work • We keep doing things that have never been proven to work • We address individuals, not “gangs” and groups • Addressing individuals only works on an individual basis – doesn’t take out the market • We do not engage directly with the street culture • Let’s take back our town an area at a time…the message spreads

13. The Call-in • Wide ranging partnership: police, council, housing providers, third sector • Very small target population – the most violent • Direct, sustained communication with offenders as groups • Simple, unified message: • The community needs this to stop • We will help • We’re not asking: consequences are certain • Meticulous follow-up

14. Understanding the street code • Disrespect requires violence • We’re not afraid of death or prison • We handle our own business • We’ve got each other’s back • We’re victims • We’re justified in what we do • …is this the same here?

15. Strategic Intervention • Direct, sustained engagement with street groups: community, services, police standing and acting together • Face-to-face with gangs • Explicit focus on violence (“Stop the violence and we will help you”)

16. Consequences • Group accountability for serious youth violence: group dynamic, group sanction • Last chance has gone • Explained ahead of time • By any legal means: Achilles Heel • Most serious sanctions on impact players • Careful promise: sanction on next incident of violence, and on the most violent group • Reversal of pro-violence peer pressure • Allows for an “honourable exit”

17. Moral Engagement • Offenders can and will chose; are responsible human beings • Enormous harm being done and the community rejects it • Engagement with the dangerous and mistaken street code • Everyone is important, everyone matters • Works best if most influential nominals are involved

18. We Will Help • Everyone who wants help deserves it • Some will take it • Has to be honest: we will do everything we can, but won’t promise what we can’t deliver • Limited resources don’t change the core fact that the violence is completely unacceptable

19. Core Messages • It has to stop. It’s wrong. You’re better than this and you don’t like it either. • Your community and loved ones need it to stop • You are hugely important and valuable • The ideas of the street code are wrong • We will do everything we can to help you • We will stop you if you make us

20. Agenda for the day • Police Commander – the enforcement message • A&E Consultant – what happens to shot and stabbed bodies • Grieving Parent– when your child is killed • Ex dealer/gang member – how to get out • Mentoring trust– opportunities for help

21. Results

22. Early Intervention:Troubled Families • Holding the hands of the most chaotic families • Each borough in London has to find c.800 of the neediest families – unemployment, crime, truancy, substance misuse • Family allocated a keyworker to support journey to normality • Linking offender and gang families into this will provide sustainable approach

23. Vulnerability Focus Safeguarding • IOM • Prevent Problem Triangle Troubled Families

24. Questions? Chris Williams Chris.williams@brent.gov.uk