Police Funding 2022/23

Overview

Dear Greater Manchester residents and businesses,

It has always been one of our most important priorities to keep people in Greater Manchester safe and we could not have done it without your help, as local taxpayers.

One of our first challenges has been to reverse the years of Government cuts to frontline policing by recruiting more officers both to fight crime and, through greater visibility on our streets, to deter and prevent crime. Under our leadership, there are now 992 more police officers in Greater Manchester Police (GMP) than there were in 2017 and numbers will increase again this year.

However, while recruiting almost 1,000 more police officers is a significant achievement – thanks to your support- it has not reversed the scale of the cuts we have faced. Between 2011-19, the Government cut the grant they provide to Greater Manchester Police in real terms by £215 million, which has resulted in 2,000 fewer police officers, 1,000 fewer support staff and devastating cuts to other essential resources.

Funding for the police comes both directly from a central Government grant (75%) and from the police precept (25%). The Greater Manchester police precept, which funds GMP, is one of the lowest in the country, but it also means we are heavily reliant on Government funding to help keep our communities safe.

Through the modest increase in the police element of the council tax in 2021/22 (the precept), as well as increasing police officer numbers, the funding allowed us to invest in:

• A force-wide team tackling child sexual exploitation
• New city centre team for violence reduction
• Crisis worker pilot programme for responding to rape and serious sexual offences reports
• 150 officers for safeguarding
• Mentoring for young people involved with/at risk of becoming involved in gang activity
• Continuation of mental health tactical advice service in control rooms
• Road safety initiatives including piloting community-led Speedwatch
• Transformation in the response to and support for victims of domestic violence
• Continued work with trusted victims’ organisations.

Over this current financial year, we have also sought to address the concerns raised by HMICFRS in their inspection of GMP in December 2020. Under a new Chief Constable, Stephen Watson, who took office in May, there have already been significant improvements. The 52-week average answer time for 999 calls of 36 seconds has reduced to 27 seconds by the end of 2021; there has been a 55% reduction in the waiting list for incidents to be dealt with; an investment in 167 extra new cars for response officers and increased driver training capacity so more staff can respond to emergency situations; a focus on arresting more criminals; a 92% attendance rate at burglaries with the aim to offer attendance to every victim; and compliance with crime recording standards improved from 77% to over 90%, with over 95% for crimes involving some of the most vulnerable victims.

We have also sought to improve accountability of GMP and of us, with our police and crime commissioner responsibilities by introducing meetings for elected representative across the city-region to question us and scrutinise our decisions. The first of these meetings took place in November 2021.

Last year we also published a new and ambitious ten-year Greater Manchester Gender-Based Violence Strategy; a new Board to oversee its implementation has had its first meeting. A campaign aimed at tackling the harassment of women and girls in public places by men and boys was launched in December with the campaign video viewed over four million times on Twitter.

We will also be publishing the independent reviews into child sexual exploitation in Oldham and Rochdale this year.

Our priorities for policing for the next financial year have to be met from the funding we will receive. The 2022/23 provisional settlement from central Government for police includes an increase in the Police Core Grant of 6% to continue to recruit additional officers.  However, while this funding is welcome, it will not make up for the hollowing out of our police force. This is why we still need to raise some funds locally to ensure we can continue to provide the policing you want. The grant we received for 2020/21 was £10m less than we got a decade ago in 2010/11, and that is without factoring in inflation.

The Government has given us the ability to raise the precept by up to £0.83 a month (£10 a year for an average Band D property and £7.77 a year for an average Band B property) and this is the proposal in this consultation. The current police precept for a Band D property is £218.30 which would increase next year to £228.30 a year and a Band B property will go up from £169.78 to £177.55. 

If this proposed modest increase in the police precept is supported by you and agreed by the Greater Manchester Police and Crime Panel, then along with the central Government grant we will have the funding to work together with to deliver:

• The transformation of the GMP contact centre – increasing staffing levels and flexibility to ensure calls are answered quickly and police officers are sent to those in need immediately.
• 438 additional police officers, with 60 of them dedicated to road safety which will allow travel safe officers to focus on other policing such as public transport safety.
• Continuation of the new Operation Avro days of action. These days which will take place in each area of Greater Manchester will see a surge of officers and specially trained teams dealing with issues communities tell GMP they want to see dealt with.
• A community messaging system that Neighbourhood Policing Teams will use to inform local communities about what they are doing and that the public can use to get more involved in working with local police officers to identify issues of concern within the locality.

We have faced some challenges to policing in recent times, but we strongly believe we are turning a corner with a new Chief Constable, continued investment in frontline officers and key services, and improved accountability. With your help, we hope to continue to do this.

Andy Burnham, Mayor of Greater Manchester and Bev Hughes, Deputy Mayor for Policing, Crime, Criminal Justice and Fire

What happens next

The feedback that has been collected during this consultation will be used to inform the Mayor and Deputy Mayor's decision about how much the public should contribute to police funding in 2022/23.