Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) action plan - summer 2024 updates

We will work to eliminate police perpetrated domestic abuse and sexual offences and we will improve the effectiveness of our response to these crimes.

Summer 2024 updates

Results on offenders  

Note: Please be aware that this type of data is constantly changing with parallel criminal and misconduct investigations.

Over the last 12 months our Professional Standards DASO unit (Domestic Abuse and Sexual Offences) handled 282 cases involving police officers or staff. 78% (217) of these have a linked criminal investigation.

In the same period, 30 officers or staff have been dismissed and 11 would have been dismissed if they had been serving for DASO gross misconduct cases (this is 26% of all Met gross misconduct dismissals).

Results from Operation Onyx 

We have reviewed all closed Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) conduct or criminal allegations against Met officers or staff, reported between April 2012 to April 2022.

1,636 serving officers or staff were identified and every individual has been assessed and appropriate risk management measures put in place. Of these:

• 227 are no longer in the Met
• 200 are subject to re-vetting. So far, 57 have had their vetting removed and 16 have exited the Met
• 34 cases have led to new or reopened investigations and improved engagement with 200 victims. Victim feedback has been very positive and allowed them to make informed decisions regarding their own safety and that of their families

Better tracking of risk as officers and staff move across the Met  

Our Anti-Corruption and Abuse Command has taken significant steps to identify and intervene with those who pose a risk, checking the entire Met against both the Police National Computer and Police National Database in order to understand which officers and staff have been involved in, or suspected of, crime anywhere in the UK.

Our Integrity Assurance Unit works with managers to put in place and monitor risk management measures where an individual’s behaviour is considered to be a risk. This can limit what roles an officer can perform. Working with vetting specialists we are developing ongoing integrity screening for roles that have particular proximity to vulnerable people. 

Serious or chronic cases of concern, particularly around VAWG, are prioritised for vetting reviews.

Reporting lines

Between May 2023 to April 2024, 28% of internal anonymous reporting was categorised as relating to VAWG or other sexual misconduct. This is a greater proportion than previous years, and we consider demonstrates greater confidence in reporting.

The independent Crimestoppers anti-abuse and anti-corruption hotline, has led to a number of new investigations and criminal charges. 

Support to victims

In March 2024 we made changes to ensure a minimum standard of review and senior oversight is mandatory for investigations involving police perpetrators, including clear commitments about what victims can expect.

We make sure that victims who are also part of the Met are given protections so that, for example, their cases are not investigated by anyone who is connected to either them or the perpetrator. We offer victims specialist support and have committed to involve victims in the decision-making process throughout the investigation.

We continue to invest in Independent Domestic and Sexual Violence Advocacy support.

We have a growing community of support for employee victims of domestic abuse (including where the perpetrator is a colleague) developed by victim-survivors who have been courageous in sharing their experiences with others.

An internal staff survey was completed in April and May 2024. This survey has provided key data by which to baseline (and improve) the Met’s effectiveness at supporting officers and staff who experience domestic abuse. The results are clear and we must improve in this area:

• 43% of the 358 respondents felt that nothing changed in terms of support at work following their disclosure that they had or were experiencing domestic abuse
• 62% of colleagues were aware of our dedicated IDVA (independent domestic violence advisor) and ISVA (independent sexual violence advisor) service
• the average score (out of 5) for how the respondent rated the support they received from the Met was 2.85

Vetting  

We have reformed our vetting policy to ensure that concerns relating to domestic abuse or sexual offences are strong grounds for refusal or withdrawal and attract more senior decision making in every case.

Vetting information is not categorised in a way that allows cases with a VAWG context to be isolated as a stand-alone data-set, but overall vetting rejections have increased to 11.4% (2023/24) from 6.9% (2021/22). 

External scrutiny 

The work of Operation Onyx (review of all completed sexual offence or domestic abuse cases from the last 10 years) is scrutinised by external experts and to date 127 cases have been assessed by a scrutiny panel.

The scrutiny panel is made up of representatives from the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC), independent VAWG partners, charities, and VAWG champions who provide challenge and assurance in relation to outcome decisions.

We have recently hosted a workshop with partners from MOPAC, local authorities, NHS, Hestia, Victim Support, Women’s Resource Centre, Solace, Refuge, Women’s Aid, and Survivors UK, to support the next stages of the work and inform the wider approach to VAWG scrutiny.