Recommendation - West Yorkshire Police, December 2022
We identified organisational learning from a Death or serious injury review of welfare concerns raised to the police prior to a man's death. We also issued a national learning recommendation in relation to this review.
IOPC reference
Recommendations
The IOPC recommends that West Yorkshire Police take steps to ensure that staff in its force Contact Management Centre understand who is responsible for updating callers when a call grading is changed.
This follows an IOPC review of a local death and serious injury (DSI) investigation by the force professional standards department whereby a call which was initially assessed as ‘priority’ (requiring a police response within 60 minutes) was downgraded to a ‘standard’ response (requiring a police response within 48 hours) following a supervisor review. This was not communicated to the reporting person and resulted in her having to wait longer than expected outside her partner’s address for a welfare check on him. Her partner was subsequently discovered deceased. Had she been informed that police were not going to imminently attend, this would have provided the caller with the opportunity to take alternative action. Relevant West Yorkshire Police policies and procedures are not clear about who is responsible for notifying the caller when a call is downgraded.
Do you accept the recommendation?
Yes
Accepted action:
In terms of who the responsibility sits with for ensuring callers are updated regarding grading changes, Contact management confirmed that it would be Dispatch Supervision. If a downgrade request is made is made by a District, they should be advised to add a rationale for the request to the log, and the dispatcher should then notify the reporting person of any delay or change of plan contrary to what they were advised in the initial call regarding the grading. This procedure is part of Standard Operating Procedures (SOPS) and covered in Dispatcher training, as well as subsequently being covered within a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU).
Supervisors also receive an alert when a regrade takes place, and at this point should be ensuring that the call back is made. A reminder of this obligation has been recently cascaded to Dispatch Supervisors in a THRIVE/re-THRIVE circulation.
Since the formal recommendation was made, I can confirm that all Contact staff have been reminded of the requirement to notify a caller when a log is re-graded.
As complimentary work, Contact management recently adjusted the manner in which they retrospectively audit logs around THRIVE. That auditing includes looking at re-grades, and consequently recontacting callers when a log is regraded so there is an increased focus in this area to ensure improved compliance. Areas for improvement would be identified and targeted from the audit results, whether it be teams of individual learning.
Contact are also currently integrating a new telephony and radio system. The new system will be a ‘total contact’ solution, which will allow easier contact with an individual, whether this is a text message or a call back. It is envisaged that the system will make re-contacting callers easier for a Dispatcher and allow them to more easily identify repeat callers and vulnerability.
In terms of individual learning, it was confirmed in the original report of investigation that those involved in the log grading change would be given feedback about the responsibility of updating callers.