Cost of National Police Database screening project

Freedom of information request reference no: 01.FOI.24.035404

I note you seek access to the following information:

All 50,000 Met employees were recently checked against the National Police Database as part of the largest integrity screening project undertaken in policing.

1. Can you let me know what the data base checking was looking at.
Please split all the categories out with the number so of ‘flags’ against each category

RE-DEFINED ON 30/01/2024:
My request relate specifically to this additional process that was undertaken to re check all in the Met police. 

2. All 50,000 Met employees were recently checked against the National Police Database as part of the largest integrity screening project undertaken in policing. What did this process cost?

Decision

Having considered this request, I regret to advise that the duty in Section 1(1)(a) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (the Act). I have today decided to disclose some of the requested information. Some data has been withheld as it is exempt from disclosure and therefore this response serves as a Refusal Notice under Section 17 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (the Act) by virtue of the following exemptions:

Section 21(1) – Accessible via other means

Reason for decision

The S.21 Exemption has been utilised in relation to Q.1. This is because the results of this process (Operation Trawl) were published by the NPCC on 23/01/2024 and the details are already available in the public domain. I have provided the relevant link below for your reference.

With reference to Q.2, the MPS does not hold the precise cost of Op Trawl. This is because the cost of a police operation is largely comprised of the following elements:
1. Police officer and police staff time spent planning the operation.
2. Police officer and police staff time deployed during the course of an operation.
3. Police officer and police staff time deployed after an operation debriefing or preparing applicable documentation.
4. Police officer and police staff overtime payments.
5. Equipment and miscellaneous expenses (i.e. building costs).

In addition to the above in relation to Q.2, following are some of the reasons why the information requested is not held and can therefore not be provided:
a) Police operations are typically costed within the Met via a cost code. Cost codes are attributed by the Met’s Finance Team to an activity, operation or investigation and allows defined costs to be recorded. There are no cost codes attributed to Operation Trawl, Onyx, Assure or Dragnet.
b) Police officers record their daily duties on the Computer Aided Resource Management System (CARMS), but generally do not record their duties in sufficient detail to enable the precise time spent on a particular operation to be established.
c) Police employees and in particular, senior police officers, are involved in a number of different operations, investigations and activities at any given time. In many cases, an employee’s duties for a particular day are not dedicated to a single operation, investigation or activity.
d) Members of police staff are generally not required to record their daily duties on any system. There is therefore often no record of staff time spent on a particular operation.
e) Each member of staff receives a unique salary based on their individual rate of pay as they progress through the pay spine of their respective grade. Rates of pay also differ based on any applicable allowances and the pension scheme to which each member of staff is aligned. The MPS also makes individual national insurance contributions and pension contributions for each employee. Accurate employee costs per operation can therefore only be calculated based on individual rates of pay/costs and the time they have spent performing duties in connection with that operation. This cannot accurately be calculated owing to the absence of reliable data as set out at points (a) – (d) above.
f) Equipment and other miscellaneous costs cannot be accurately reported by the MPS.
g) The cost of MPS operations are typically estimated.

Disclosure

DUTY TO ADVISE & ASSIST
Under Section 16 of the Act, there is a duty to advise and assist applicants in making requests for information and I have provided some links below in relation to the relevant information that is already available in the public domain.

NPCC - Results published in policing’s largest integrity screening project

MPS - Delivering Higher Standards

It may also assist you to note that the MPS proactively publishes information about different events, operations and investigations on its website, as well as all disclosures made in response to requests made under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. I have provided a link to this section of the MPS website below.

MPS Publication Scheme

The MPS Publication Scheme can be searched using keywords and may also hold other information that is of interest to you.