Erewash Community Safety Partnership Plan

The world in which we work and live continues to challenge us. A new normal was beginning to emerge following the pandemic, for people to be then thrown into a cost of living crisis, the likes of which younger people have never seen. Communities and organisations continue to provide support, as they strive to help individuals, households and groups to find a way through the most challenging situations.

Our collective aim is to support residents and visitors to be and feel safe, whether at home, or active across the borough, county or further afield.

To be safe, the partnership takes action across many different areas of work to help reduce crime and these are impacted upon by outside influences out of our control. Over the past 24 months, this has included the further development and delivery of national agendas, including around anti-social behaviour, exploitation, serious violence and disorder and asylum / immigration. These areas of work have also put additional pressures and responsibilities on our strategic partners at a time when resources are stretched, meaning that we must focus and work together even smarter to have the impact we all want.

Erewash’s Community Safety Partnership also continues to build upon our relationships with other partnerships and organisations, acknowledging the key links to health and wellbeing, housing and economic and social regeneration. We cannot talk about perceptions of crime and behaviour without also acknowledging other aspects of an area; physical resources of organisations (such as streetlights, time spent on upkeep of spaces and places), trust of the organisations there to keep people safe, and feeling heard and supported when reporting issues that matter. Together, this all shapes whether someone feels safe and connected in their local area.

Adaptation and flexibility in the delivery of community safety work has always been key, and as a partnership we will continue to work tirelessly to respond to all these challenges and opportunities facing us, together. With you standing with us, wanting the same things, we know we can make a difference.

Councillor Everett
Chair, Erewash Community Safety Partnership
& Deputy Leader, Erewash Borough Council

The Crime & Disorder Act 1998 (as amended) first introduced partnerships to tackle local crime and disorder concerns; Community Safety Partnerships (CSPs). The legislation acknowledged that organisations, and the work and decisions they make have an impact on crime, ASB and disorder, and that coming together to discuss, plan and action these ensures this has the best outcome for all.

The local partnership is made up of representatives from a number of organisations (known as the ‘responsible authorities’). These are:

• Local authorities
• Police
• Fire and Rescue authority
• Health services, and
• Probation services

The introduction of Police & Crime Commissioners brought with it a duty for CSPs to co-operate with and consider their Police & Crime Plans and in Erewash, we welcome the PCC and their office to the table. The partnership can and should work with anyone in the local area that can have an impact on community safety, including other organisations, voluntary and community groups.

In most areas including Erewash, the team based at the council co-ordinates the work of the partnership. The team are in place to facilitate partners to tackle the work streams of the partnership but are not the partnership. These workstreams have been added to over the years, through identifying local, regional and national priorities, with the team ensuring that the work done locally remains relevant to the area.

Despite all of the changes since 1998, the principles of working together to achieve greater things remains at the heart of the community safety approach.

Community Safety Partnerships (CSPs) are a statutory function and have a number of strategic requirements. These are:

• Produce an annual strategic intelligence assessment of data and knowledge
• Set out the CSP priorities in a partnership plan
• Establish information sharing agreements

There is also legislation that identifies key areas of operational work for the partnership. Underneath the Acts, there is statutory guidance and case law that supports the operational work of the organisations involved.

This is not an exhaustive list of areas of work for the partnership, and the individual organisations that sit as part of the CSP. Other areas of work include other crime types or the impact of crime including acquisitive crime, serous organised crime, robbery, shop lifting and fraud.

A number of national policy changes have also influenced the work of CSPs recently including:

Anti-Social Behaviour Action Plan

Launched in March 2023, the plan requires agencies to treat ASB issues with urgency and taking a zero-tolerance approach, allowing police and partners the tools they need to tackle ASB. Derbyshire has been identified as a ‘trailblazer area’ and allocated additional funding of £4.4m to trial a new ‘Immediate Justice’ scheme and support additional action in areas of Derbyshire with the highest rates of ASB.

Prevent (Counter Terrorism)

December 2022 saw the Independent Review of Prevent and the Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill, known as Martyn’s Law being published, both of which will impact upon the work of the responsible authorities including Local Authorities.

Sustainability and Transformation Partnership

The Health and Care Bill 2022 replaced Clinical Commissioning Groups and created Integrated Care Partnerships as the committee where health, social care, the voluntary sector and other partners come together as an Integrated Care System (ICS). In the Derbyshire, the Integrated Care System is known as ‘Joined Up Care Derbyshire (JUCD)’.

Beating Crime Plan

This plan sets out the national strategic approach to cutting homicide, serious violence and neighbourhood crime; exposing and ending hidden harms; and building capability and capacity to deal with fraud and online crime.

Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) Strategy

The VAWG Strategy was published in 2021 and sets out the government actions to increase support for survivors, bring perpetrators to justice, and reduce the prevalence of violence against women and girls. The strategy outlines expectations for frontline professionals to work together in local areas to support delivery.

From Harm to Hope: A 10-year drugs plan to cut crime and save lives

This Strategy commits government and public services to work together and share responsibility for creating a safer, healthier and more productive society. It seeks to utilise existing partnership arrangements, including CSP’s and in Derbyshire a Drugs and Alcohol Strategic Partnership Board has been created to drive this work forward, including a Criminal Justice and Community Safety sub-group.

Part Two of the Police and Crime Commissioner Review

A full review of CSP’s is proposed to initially improve their transparency, accountability and effectiveness, before assessing their position within the wider landscape of local partnerships across England and Wales. Through this review there will also be a consultation regarding the introduction of a new duty for CSP’s to report on local anti-social behaviour strategies and delivery, along with legislation to set out the role of PCC’s in the ASB Case Review process.

Partners in Erewash and across Derbyshire are committed to working together with residents and visitors to tackle community safety matters, with mature relationships in place. However, public services are facing financial challenges, and difficult decisions are being made around resources against a backdrop of public expectation and increasing policy and legislative demands.

The areas of business continue to expand and change as intelligence and understanding around the risk and threat of each area grows. The Derbyshire Safer Communities Board appraised partnership structures and a new governance structure was established in 2022. It created thematic boards, but also acknowledged the shared priorities with the other strategic boards within Derbyshire. The aim; to achieve the greatest impact on each priority and area of business, with partnership working at the heart of the approach.

The countywide current thematic boards are:

• Serious Violence
• Violence Against Women and Girls
• Serious Organised Crime and Exploitation
• Neighbourhood Crime and Anti-social Behaviour (includes Acquisitive crime, Hate Crime and the Night-Time Economy)
• Domestic and Sexual Abuse
• Prevent
• Resettlement, Cohesion and Integration
• Online Harm

As part of this work, Erewash CSP will support and undertake both strategic and operational work of the thematic boards through action plans, as identified through the need and assessment of each.

Priorities

Erewash CSP and the partnership team will support the work on all crime, disorder and anti-social behaviour work streams within community safety. At borough level, this may be support for strategic direction and decision making, or it may be direct work with residents, referrals into specialist support or providing advice to other organisations.

The priorities for Erewash CSP are:

Neighbourhood Crime & ASB

Including the work steams of:

• Acquisitive crime
• Anti-social behaviour
• Hate crime
• Night-time economy

Violence, organised crime & exploitation

Including the work steams of:

• Serious violence
• Organised crime including County lines
• Exploitation of children and adults (including criminal and sexual)

There is a clear vision in Erewash that delivery against these priorities needs to be focussed on considering:

- A stepped approach to action:

• Prevention and education
• Diversion and early intervention
• Enforcement

- Safeguarding:

• Considering the vulnerabilities of individuals and their circumstances
• Supporting victims, residents, families and communities to access appropriate support
• And that this needs to be underpinned by clear data, professional insight and information sharing.