Information about the Violence Harm Index

Freedom of information request reference no: 01.FOI.23.034382

I note you seek access to the following information:

Request for information about the Violence Harm Index (‘VHI’).

I write to request some information in relation to the Violence Harm Index (“VHI”) in use by a number of Borough Command Units (“BCUs") since 2020.

Please provide me with the following information:

1. Which BCUs have been using the VHI?

2. Have the BCUs referred to at (1) been recording and monitoring the protected characteristics of people placed on the VHI, in particular race, age and sex/gender?

3. If the answer to (2) is ‘Yes’, please provide a breakdown for each year since 2020 and each BCU area showing the number of people on the VHI by area, race, age, sex/gender and offence type.

Decision

I have today decided to disclose the located information to you in full.

Please find below information pursuant to your request above.

Q1 - Which BCUs have been using the VHI?

The Violence Harm Index has been used only in an offender management capacity to date. All BCUs are provided with wanted offenders to be prioritised and one of the feeds in to this, is the Violence Harm Index. The boroughs will not necessarily be aware of the source of the person that is being sought only that they should be prioritising the manhunt for that individual.

Q2 - Have the BCUs referred to at (1) been recording and monitoring the protected characteristics of people placed on the VHI, in particular race, age and sex/gender?

Q3 - If the answer to (2) is ‘Yes’, please provide a breakdown for each year since 2020 and each BCU area showing the number of people on the VHI by area, race, age, sex/gender and offence type.

Special category data for those on the VHI is available from 2021 onwards and is kept and maintained centrally within the MPS as opposed to being managed locally on the BCUs.

Older versions of the VHI, also had this information but have been deleted as part of a three year retention policy.
As such data has been provided for those created in 2021, 2022 and 2023. It should be noted that these tables are not representative of all the individuals that featured on the index as it is just those that were resident within a specified BCU. A number of individuals on each index are shown as either residing outside of London or of No
Fixed Abode and as such these have not been included.

Please find below a spreadsheet in which the requested information has been provided.