The Police and Crime Commissioner does not only hold the Chief Constable to account for providing effective policing, he also looks after a wide range of issues relating to crime prevention, vicitim support and so forth.
Among the outside bodies currently supported by the Leicestershire Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner is the Domestic Homicide Review organisation. By its nature this organisation deals with confidential information, and so does not have a public website as do other organisations supported by the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner.
However, I was fascinated to learn more about the process.
Domestic Homicide Reviews were established on a statutory basis under section 9 of the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004. This provision came into force on 13th April 2011 requiring local authorities and partner agencies to devise a process to deal with DHRs underpinned by the statutory guidance provided.
Leicestershire County Council, the seven District LA’s and Rutland County Council entered into a partnership. This ‘County’ partnership approach was adopted given the [thankfully] relatively low number and frequency of DHR’s across each locality. Retaining the necessary personnel on a speculative basis with the necessary expertise on each and every authority was not practical given the infrequency and geographical spread of incidents.
This DHR governance agreement was reached under the auspices of the Leicestershire Safer Communities Strategy Board, The Local Safeguarding Children’s Board (now The Safeguarding Children’s Partnership) and the Leicestershire & Rutland Safeguarding Adults Board.
All DHR’s across the seven districts and Rutland are managed through a single office (The Safeguarding Partnership Business Office -SPBO). The SPBO retains the expertise to manage the DHR’s on behalf of all the Districts & Rutland CC making suitable contact via Leicestershire County Council Community Safety Team when key decisions for legal compliance are required. The SPBO ensures statutory compliance liaising as required with the Home Office, recruiting and servicing the needs of the DHR Independent Chairs and DHR Report Authors, arranging and running DHR panel meetings and all ancillary functions necessary for the proper running of DHR enquiries.
The DHR stakeholders within the Leicestershire Safer Communities Strategy Board each contribute an agreed element of the total funding to support the arrangement, this includes the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner.
There are two elements to the funding;
- The DHR Panel - Funding the cost and ancillary expenses required to actually run the DHR itself. Commissioning of the Independent Chair and Overview Author and associated costs such as expense, venues and refreshments.
- Backoffice - SPBO Office based support which based on three DHR’s per year would require a part time Safeguarding Officer post and a part time administration.
The nature of DHR’s mean numbers and the consequential cost and expenses associated with them do fluctuate. Despite the 2012 costings to date there has been sufficient capacity and contingency within current arrangements to meet requirements.
My thanks to the staff at Leicestershire County Council for helping me to better understand the provision of this important service.
