Grant Funding Acceptance Multi Agency Response Drug Trafficking Pilot

This decision requests the acceptance of £135,000 grant funding from the Home Office to enable a closer examination of the individuals who facilitate the ‘middle market’ between drug importers in the UK, violent gang members and those involved in the establishment and control of County Lines drug dealing. The funding is available until 31 March 2021. The funding will be used to fund overtime for police officers and law enforcement agents in order to give them the capacity to conduct fuller enquiries against subjects concerned in the ‘middle market’ of drugs.

The Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime is recommended to approve the acceptance of £135,000 of Serious Organised Crime SOC Grant funding to support additional police officer overtime, and via cross charging to other Law Enforcement in other forces or agencies, through the provision of overtime, and will be requested and tasked by the MPS Detective Inspector (DI) who controls the funds.

1. Introduction and background

1.1. This papers seeks the authority to accept Home Office funding to enable the closer examination of the individuals who facilitate the ‘middle market’ between drug importers in the UK, violent gang members and those involved in the establishment and control of County Lines drug dealing.

2. Issues for consideration

2.1. The grant will be used to fund overtime for police officers and law enforcement agents in order to give them the capacity to conduct fuller enquiries against subjects concerned in the ‘middle market’ of drugs.

2.2. The MPS state that the acceptance of the grant contributes to the MOPAC Police & Crime Plan priorities as the pilot will develop the national and London SOC threat picture and, in doing so, enable better informed and more effective policing responses to the individuals and groups causing the greatest amount of harm. In addition, the pilot will give greater collective agility to capitalise on intelligence opportunities and dividends. This pilot will also help lever greater support from the National SOC capabilities to better mitigate priority threats in London. This includes targeting organised crime groups engaged in serious violence and criminally exploiting children through their recruitment in County Lines.

3. Financial Comments

3.1. The proposal is for the acceptance of grant funding of £135,000 for 2020/21.

4. Legal Comments

4.1. The grant is accepted under Schedule 3, Paragraph 7 of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011 which provides that

• 7(1)The Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime may do anything which is calculated to facilitate, or is conducive or incidental to, the exercise of the functions of the Office.

• (2)That includes—

• (a)entering into contracts and other agreements (whether legally binding or not);

4.2. Paragraph 4.8 of the MOPAC Scheme of Delegation and Consent provides that the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime (DMPC) has delegated authority to approve all bids for grant funding.

5. GDPR and Data Privacy

5.1. MOPAC will adhere to the Data Protection Act (DPA) 2018 and ensure that any organisations who are commissioned to do work with or on behalf of MOPAC are fully compliant with the policy and understand their GDPR responsibilities.

5.2. The MPS state that “The project does not use currently personally identifiable data of members of the public, beyond that used in standard investigation, so there are no current GDPR issues to be considered. The screening questions for a DPIA have been completed, and this project does not trigger a DPIA.”

6. Equality Comments

6.1. MOPAC is required to comply with the public sector equality duty set out in section 149(1) of the Equality Act 2010. This requires MOPAC to have due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination, advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations by reference to people with protected characteristics. The protected characteristics are: age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation.

6.2. The MPS state that they have reviewed the proposal for an Equality Impact Assessment and has determined that it does “ not trigger any adverse impact as there are believed to be no apparent changes to the existing process in the roleholders duties that would demonstrate otherwise and that the grant would be used to increase capacity of that already existing function”

6.3. At the end of the project, the results will be reviewed and analysed to determine the extent of any positive or negative impacts on any particular community.

7. Background/supporting papers

• Appendix 1 MPS Report Grant Funding for Piloting an Enhanced Multi-Agency Response to Drug Trafficking.