4 September 2024
Minutes of Meeting
Meeting: COT Board
Venue: Scarborough Briefing Room, Scarborough Police Station
Date and Time: 04.09.24 @ 11:30am – 2:00pm
ITEM 1: ATTENDANCE CC Forber - Chair
ACC Clarke
T/ACC Fox
ACO Lisa Stitt
CFO Louise Branford-White
Chief Inspector Roffe – Staff Officer
Maeve Chappell – Head of Corporate Communications
Sarah Gardiner – GSO, Executive Support
APOLOGIES DCC Bisset
ITEM 2: Review of minutes Summary of Discussion: The minutes of the previous meeting were reviewed and agreed.
ITEM 3: Review of Action Log Summary of Discussion:
Action 593 – Operational Training Centre. Agenda item. Closed.
Action 598 – Transport Decision Tree. Agenda item at JNCC. Closed.
Action 599 – Transport Decision Tree. Hire car booking trends. Remitted to the Savings and Efficiency Board. Closed.
Action 615 – Pension Abatement. CFO consulting with Legal Services. Closed.
ITEM 4: Operational Training Centre (OTC) Summary of Discussion:
T/Chief Supt Fran Naughton Head of Protective Services, Supt Andrew Berriman Specialist Operations and Tim Edwards Head of Estates joined the meeting.
CFO Louise Branford-White provided a financial overview and a discussion took place around costs and potential revenue income that could be generated from NYP having its own training centre.
Further analysis would be required in relation to potential income streams if the project goes ahead to ensure they are reasonable, practical and regular.
ACO Stitt raised sending officers/staff to other forces for training had cost implications and availability issues.
The COT was supportive to provide a single site within force for specialist operational training including PPST, Taser and Firearms Range. The force has training challenges now and these will increase.
A final decision will be made when the Chief Constables Statement of Need is discussed.
CFO will discuss with Michael Porter OPFCC Chief Finance Officer. This is a good long-term investment for the force, the force must have the facilities to train its officers to do the job. The CC raised the long term strategic implications for the force if not progressed.
ITEM 5: Personal Vehicle Provision Summary of Discussion:
Claire Ellis Transport & Logistics Manager and Lee Chapman Chief of Staff to the ACO joined the meeting.
The Provided Vehicle Scheme (PVS) covers the use of vehicles provided by North Yorkshire Police (NYP) for operational policing purposes and is provided to Chief Officers, Chief Superintendents and Superintendents.
The scheme was last reviewed in May 2019. In total the PVS provides approximately 18 vehicles to the Chief Superintendents and Superintendents irrespective of role. Those in long-term temporary roles are also eligible to be provided with a vehicle and as a result the number of provided vehicles does temporarily fluctuate.
There is a clear operational need for the Superintendent ranks to undertake business travel to conduct their operational duties and to perform on call functions. This capability currently costs NYP approximately £159,003 per year.
If we were to only offer a S01 class of vehicle and operate each vehicle for a period of six years or when it reaches 180,000 miles, then this cost can be reduced to approximately £126,384.
Claire Ellis confirmed this is part of the capital programme for 2025/26 and the plan would be to move away from diesel vehicles in the future. If the PVS was discontinued then NYP would have to make milage payments, per mile and also pay an essential user allowance.
Decision – COT supported the use of SO1 class code vehicles only.
ITEM 6: Mobile Police Technology Summary of Discussion:
Inspector Neil Soulby Operational Business Change and Tracey Arnell Senior Engineer – Development joined the meeting and provided a brief history around the draft business case.
North Yorkshire police, NYP, do not have a mobile application to support officers when away from a station.
Functionality is limited to a few in house applications and Niche Mobile. Many of the applications available do not support working when there is no data signal to connect back to NYP systems and cannot reuse data across the applications resulting in dual entering data.
Officers coming into force from other areas see this as a retrograde step and feel their productivity is impaired by not having this technology.
The NYP Digital Policing Strategy highlights this as an area of need and implementation of a mobile policing solutions is supported by the COT.
3 options were discussed.
* Option 1 – Do nothing.
* Option 2 – Go to market to procure a solution.
* Option 3 – NYP develop an in-house solution. Operational Engagement has taken place this included operational officers from various roles.
DECISION - 1. Supported - Mobile policing solution is to be pursued.
2. Supported - Commercial product should be funded and procured via appropriate frameworks, proven in other forces.
3. Not supported - In-house development of the functionality.
4. Supported - To support the development of full business cases in accordance with the finance and business planning cycle.
ACTION – Remitted to Change Board to develop to a full business case and allocate a PPMO.
ITEM 7: Uniform Policy Summary of Discussion:
Inspector David Anderson and Sergeant Elaine Malcolm Staff Officers to the COT joined the meeting and briefed the COT on the amendments made to the draft policy.
Attendees were advised consultation had taken place and the paper had also been heard at the JNCC Board.
An Equality Impact Assessment had also been completed.
The CC would like Officers and Staff to always look professional and requested Custodian Helmets be issued to officers who go out on foot patrol and any change in uniform will remain within budget.
DECISION – The Uniform Policy was agreed for implementation and publication agreed.
ITEM 8: People Management Summary of Discussion:
The secondment advert requests were reviewed. The Staff roles were approved.
ITEM 9: Review of the Executive Board Planner Summary of Discussion:
Rebecca Baran (RB) Head of Corporate Development joined the meeting. The planner was reviewed and RB will liaise with the OPFCC.
ITEM 10: COT Forward Planner Summary of Discussion:
The Forward Planner was reviewed no items raised.
ITEM 11: Urgent Financial Decisions and Updates Summary of Discussion:
Non raised.
ITEM 12: Any other Portfolio Updates by Exception Summary of Discussion:
Non raised.
ITEM 13: Chief Officer Team Commitments Summary of Discussion: Non raised.
ITEM 14: Any other business Summary of Discussion: Non raised.
DATE AND TIME OF NEXT MEETING Date of next meeting: 18th September 2024 Time: 09:30am