VRU – Engaging Young Leaders and Research/Conference costs

Keeping Londoners safe is a top Mayoral priority and the Violence Reduction Unit (VRU) was established to adopt a public health approach towards tackling violence in the capital.

The VRU has published a strategy and work programme with eight key objectives. In line with these objectives, a programme of spend has been developed.

The VRU has a budget of £14.8 million which includes £7 million awarded by the Home Office for 2019/20. This proposed decision would include up to £355,000 of the overall budget spend to focus on allocating grants to young people to lead local engagement projects, to identify and develop young community leaders and provide insight into young people’s experiences in communities and bring this into public policy. The decision also requests approval to allocate funding towards finalising the Homicide Review and Strategic Needs Assessment, as well as an amendment to a previous decision.

The Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime is recommended to approve four elements of work:

1. Approve entering into a competitive grants process to appoint a grants management agency to facilitate funding of up to 30 grants (of up to £10,000 per organisation) to enable young people to lead local engagement projects through a new ‘Engaging Young Leaders Programme’.

- Approve entering into a competitive process to identify an evaluation partner for this programme of work.

- Delegate finalising the contract for the grants management agency to the Director of Violence Reduction Unit following a compliant procurement process.

- Agree funding of up to £355,000 to be allocated to this programme of work.

2. Allocate a further £22,853 to the Social Care Institute for Excellence towards the finalisation of the Homicide Review and Strategic Needs Assessment.

3. Allocate £25,000 towards the Institute of Global Policing conference focused on Violence Reduction and the National VRU workshop facilitated with the Home Office, attended by all 18 VRU’s.

4. Directly allocate £640,000 to 16 boroughs to deliver after school provision. This is to be funded from within the previously approved £1.2m (PCD 648 and 673) allocated towards after school provision.

1. Introduction and background

1.1. This decision outlines and requests DMPC approval to approve four elements of work. These include:

1.2. To release funding to allocate up to £300,000 for an ‘Engaging Young Leaders Programme’ through a grants management agency (expected to cost up to £55,000) that will be procured in accordance with normal MOPAC compliant processes. This will provide for up to 30 grants, of up to £10,000 each, for young people to lead local engagement projects through charity organisations. This meets the aims of the VRU through offering young people the opportunity to lead change in their communities.

1.3. Separately, the decision also requests that further funding of £22,853 is allocated to Social Care Institute for Excellence for the publication of the final report.

1.4. The Institute for Global City Policing, and independent centre based at the UCL Jill Dando Institute of Security and Crime Science, (funded and managed in partnership with MOPAC and the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS)) is hosting a conference at the end of January focused on Violence Reduction. MPS and UCL are organising this jointly. This conference is being delivered with the primary purpose of supporting the VRU to apply the evidence base in its work, and therefore working with the Public Health Approach in mind and working with relevant partners to deliver the event. The VRU have agreed to pay £15,000 towards the cost of the event. The VRU is also hosting a national event being attended by all 18 VRU’s from England and Wales, facilitated with the Home Office, and a budget of £10,000 is required for this.

1.5. In the previously approved DMPC decisions (PCD 648 and 673) £1,200,000 was allocated towards after school provision, to be funded via a competitive grants process. This decision requests that of the £1,200,000 allocation, £640,000 is allocated towards 16 boroughs who are existing recipients of the VRU Education programme, as an additional element to enhance and evaluate the targeted approach in supporting inclusive schools.

2. Issues for consideration

2.1. In May 2019, the VRU Partnership Reference Group committed to setting up a Young Person’s Action Group for the unit. Between June and September, the unit carried out a series of consultative workshops and planning activities with young people towards setting up the group.

2.2. The Young Persons Action Group will support the local engagement projects and provide insight into the organisations to co-design the project.

2.3. The aims of the Engaging Young Leaders Programme are to:

1. Strengthen connections and engagement with young people whose voice and influence on public policy is under-represented, particularly regarding community safety and positive pathways for young people

2. Improve the VRU’s insight into young people’s experiences in communities who do not currently have a voice in City Hall

3. Identify and develop young community leaders within and support their personal and professional development

2.4. This programme is based on the Mayor’s Citizen-Led Engagement programme, which was piloted in 2017-18 by the GLA Community Engagement Team to address inequalities and has continued to deliver into 2019.

2.5. The Social Care Institute for Excellence have been undertaking work developing the Homicide Review and Strategic Needs Assessment. A further £22,853 is required to produce and finalise the report in a format appropriate for publication.

3. Financial Comments

3.1. Total funding requested is £402,853 and is within the existing VRU budget. In addition, a request is made to amend the existing commissioning route for after school provision (£640,000 of the previously approved £1,200,000).

3.2. It is anticipated that of the funding allocated to the Engaging Young People programme, £55,000 will be spent on a grant management agency to disseminate grants to up to 30 organisations. The grants will be issued to registered charities, social enterprises or community interest companies that can demonstrate meaningful engagement with local young people. Within the overall allocation of up to £355,000, there will also be funding for evaluation. This is within existing budget, which will be reprofiled to 2020/21.

4. Legal Comments

4.1. MOPAC has powers under the Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 (formerly under the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011) to award grants to secure the reduction of crime and disorder in London.

4.2. Paragraph 4.8 of the MOPAC’s Scheme of Consent and Delegation provides the DMPC with delegated power to:

• approve bids for grant funding made and all offers made of grant funding; and/or where appropriate a strategy for grant giving.

• The strategy for the award of individual grants and/ or the award of all individual grants whether to secure or contribute to securing crime reduction in London or for other purposes.

5. Commercial Issues

5.1. We will be undertaking a competitive procurement process to both engage a grant management agency to facilitate the award of approximately 30 grants of £10k to organisations, as well as identifying an evaluation partner.

5.2. The funding to Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) will be directly allocated as it is building on existing work by the SCIE (with this additional part being requested by the VRU).

6. Public Health Approach

6.1. The spend plan takes a public health approach to tackling violence, which means looking at violence not as isolated incidents or solely a police enforcement problem. Instead, this approach looks at violence as a preventable consequence of a range of factors, such as adverse early-life experiences, or harmful social or community experiences and influences.

7. GDPR and Data Privacy

7.1. A full Data Protection Impact Assessment will be completed by all providers if required as part of the mobilisation for the services, to ensure that all delivery is fully compliant with the requirements of the GDPR.

7.2. All contracts and grant agreements will include clear provisions relating to compliance in this area, and in relation to the processing of personal data. These terms have been drafted following consultation with MOPAC’s GDPR Project Manager.

8. Equality Comments

8.1. Under s149 of the Equality Act 2010 (the Equality Act), as a public authority the Deputy Mayor/MOPAC must have due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination, harassment and victimisation, and any conduct that is prohibited by or under this Act; and to advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations between people who share a protected characteristic and those who do not. Protected characteristics under the Equality Act are age, disability, gender re-assignment, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, and marriage or civil partnership status (the duty in respect of this last characteristic is to eliminate unlawful discrimination only).

8.2. The Violence Reduction Unit has commissioned an Equality Impact Assessment. The impact assessment recognises the importance of ethnicity, sex, age and socio-economic background as equality characteristics that the VRU programme will impact in positive ways through commissioning a programme that works with young people who are most affected by violence, with a focus on those who are disproportionately represented as victims and perpetrators (BAME groups). The assessment also highlights the need to recognise the distinct experiences of male and female young people. The Engaging Young Londoners grants will aim to support a range of youth-led project which address these equalities issues with appropriate clarity and sensitivity.

9. Background/supporting papers

9.1 None.