Now more than ever we need evidence based policies. For too long we have had policy based evidence. We need brave public sector organisations who are prepared to work together, this includes “sharing” data, in order to robustly evaluate what works to address in equalities 1/15
Too often we have evaluated a policy post it’s implementation & often in the isolation of one agency. The police regularly do this. Often the output measured is crime, is it up or down, have there been more or less searches or non-incidents, what’s happening to police demand?2/15
It’s more complex than that, every action by one agency has effects elsewhere in the system for another, changes in health mental health services is an obvious example which could change demand on the police, the police charging suspects creates demand in the court, but also 3/15
Probation, courts, health (due to orders or pre-sentence reports) & the prison if an offender is committed. However what is less discussed is the complex interactions of events, particularly those that create harm elsewhere to others on the periphery. One better understood 4/15
Example is @operationencomp, we rightly share info on children exposed to domestic abuse, recognising this as an ACE, & that teachers need to know to understand behaviour at & support. But consider parental imprisonment, is this information shared? Do we recognise that 5/15
An action could expose a child to trauma? Are we acting quickly enough? Should we be evaluating the effect of a policy across the public sector? Should we measure the effects at micro, meso and macro levels? I’m sure most people would say a responsible public sector would 6/15
However this often fails due to poor information sharing. I believe the #ViolenceReductionUnits and a #PublicHealthApprpach offers hope. The duty to share under the Serious Violence Bill should also help. Some may say this is Problem Orientated Policing rebranded, they’d be 7/15
Right, but a focus on health’s role in reducing crime is more central in a public health approach, and its an approach, that’s different to saying its healths responsibility (but I digress). Info “sharing” must be done appropriately. We don’t need a system where data is 8/15
Stored in such a way that the police can see data held by other angencies, but what the public deserve is separate organisations to use their data together to clearly evaluate their policies effects across policing, health, social care, education & across networks, families,9/15
Places & across time. If we get this right the public will trust the use of data that can build a fairer society, we can focus resources on people and places to create equity, & know it works. For too long this hasn’t happened. 10/15
Time again we read in serious case reviews opportunities were missed, often a person is known to several services, but this is not always obvious to see as they are not know to all services at the same time. But orgs will not share info earlier as often thresholds are 11/15
Not met. Again “sharing” can assist in understanding the scale of the challenge, if we don’t, we don’t understand how many similar cases exist until it’s too late. The word sharing is in quotations in this thread. This is not about direct access by one org to another’s data 12/15
This is about evaluation of policy & understanding problems earlier, ultimately it’s about helping people. It’s about reducing inequalities. Ultimately it’s about reducing the need for the police. The police’s aim should be to create a society where we are not needed 13/15
This is about more than serious violence, but I hope the VRU work can help address some of these challenges of our time. My fear is that we may take backward steps if we don’t bring angencies together. 14/15
If we want real, lasting, change, we need to define the challenge, then we need to evaluate policies fully. 15/15
