Friday 12 June 2020

National Police Chief’s Council (NPCC) Security Systems Policy Failures.

**I am now retired from the Police Service and later resigned as a police staff member. I would usually write about two main subjects, fell walking history and police history, especially within my county, discovering two officers who's deaths have been since added to the National Roll of Honour. To that end, both the brave and moral service the police provide to my county has always been at my heart. That said, if you have no police connection, or have no premise, business or dwelling that is protected with a police compliant alarm, or have a professional interest in ensuring the police provide the ethical service they state they do, then this will be of little interest to you. If you fall into any of those categories, then although this is a big read, it is an important one and goes to the very core of the moral stance, or lack of it, of the NPCC officers themselves, sadly across the country. If that group wish to make any observations on any perceived failings in my below comments, they are entitled to do so below, for the public to further scrutinise, indeed I would encourage anyone who has a comment, positive or negative, to document those in the 'comments' field, just keep it professional.**

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National Police Chief’s Council (NPCC) Security Systems Policy Failures.

The National Police Chief’s Council is a police body which is made up of those most senior ranks of officers of Chief Constables (C. C.’s), and their Deputy and Assistant C. C.’s. They have been selected through a rigorous process designed to identify their natural skills in Leadership, Effective Management, and their Strategic Planning abilities on a county and national level. That planning they accomplish by the formulation of policies, protocols and guidelines, all encompassed within identified Policing Ethics and Principles. These are derived from a Code of Ethics devised by the National College of Policing in 2014 and published by each constabulary, to give the public the confidence that their particular constabulary will apply those ethics to everything it does in order to serve them justly. Those 9 principles are:
Accountability, Honesty, Openness, Fairness, Integrity, Objectivity, Leadership, Respect, and Selflessness.

These sound ethics go on to inform Chief Officers at section 1.4.3 that they will:
       ‘show by personal example how the principles and standards in this Code apply
       promote, support and reinforce ethical behaviour at all times
       show moral courage to do the right thing even in the face of criticism
       be consistent in what you do and say
       promote openness and transparency within policing and to the public
       promote fairness and equality in the workplace
       create and maintain an environment where you encourage challenge and feedback
       be flexible and willing to change a course of action if necessary.’

In the Preamble it states that the Code of Ethics have a statutory basis for the Code in Section 39(a) of the Police Act 1996(as amended by section 124 of the Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014) and goes on to state at 1.2.2:
‘As a code of practice, the legal status of the Code of Ethics:
a.      applies to the police forces maintained for the police areas of England and Wales as defined in section 1 of the Police Act 1996 (or as defined in any subsequent legislation)
b.      relates specifically to chief officers in the discharge of their functions.’

Later at 1.3.2 it further states:
The expectation of the public and the professional body is that every person working in policing will adopt the Code of Ethics’

To reiterate that desire for public confidence the College of Policing go on to state:
We are committed to ensuring that the Code of Ethics is not simply another piece of paper, poster or laminate, but is at the heart of every policy, procedure, decision and action in policing.’

These are fine words, but can we test whether these ethics are at the heart of every policy, procedure, decision, and action of policing? Let us measure these ethics against the NPCC National Security Systems Policy.
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To give some context to the history, there was a dramatic increase in security system activations as society went towards electronic protection systems of commercial and domestic property from criminal activity. This was also added to by vehicle alarms. The situation was becoming untenable as such systems were regularly attended as a potential crime in progress. Invariably it was from a faulty sensor or failure of staff through lack of training, or indifference in the knowledge that the police would always attend. It was realised that a definitive policy was required to give justifiable reasons why the police would NOT attend a specific activation, thus correctly utilising valuable police resources to protect the vulnerable of society and protect life itself. That policy came into existence now over 24 years ago. By its implementation it is acknowledged to have been responsible for a 90% reduction in police attendance to electronic sensor activations and its use has been a positive benefit to the correct utilisation of police resources; each attendance would have been at Immediate (blue light) Response, with all the risks that entails to public safety and staff.
Recently, it appears to have been decided that every police incident log should contain a further Risk Assessment which takes into account the Threat, Harm, Risk, Investigative Opportunities, Vulnerability, Evaluation, and Prevention and Intervention, this is the anagram THRIVE, or THRIVE+. I will touch on these later on.

Here is a link to the policy statement etc.: https://www.policesecuritysystems.com/

The policy today has the stated objectives:
·        ‘To reduce the number of false calls passed to the police
·        To provide an immediate police response to compliant security systems
·        To provide guidance to the public and security companies on police response to non-compliant systems
·        To place responsibility for compliance with the policy on a UKAS (United Kingdom Accreditation Service) accredited certification body. Enforcement of standards is not a police function
·        To achieve a unified approach to the administration process’.
Over 24 years the policy document has constantly been updated, at the time of commencing this the document was updated in October 2018, now a revised one is published in 2020 and is downloaded as a Word document in the top left corner of the section of attached documents near the start.
The downloaded document states on the first page: ‘These revised requirements have been produced and approved by the NPCC Crime Operations Coordination Committee. Requirement produced by the NPCC should be used by chief officers to shape police responses to ensure that the general public experience consistent levels of service.
So, each constabulary should provide a consistent level of service, in short it is a national policy and having published the document, each constabulary should uniformly act within its principles.
The participating or relevant bodies are:
a)      The alarmed premise/owner of the protected building [their contract is with b) below].
b)     The alarm installing company (if they take part in the police policy and fulfil the stringent requirements, they become a ‘compliant installer’.)
c)      The Police, who will issue a Unique Reference Number, referred to as a URN, to the compliant installer for that individual alarm.
d)     A compliant Alarm Receiving Centre, or ARC, who the URN is passed to by the installer at b) for 24hr monitoring. Each ARC is supplied with a single priority telephone number to contact the police with, to be used when the alarm is activated.
Within the NPCC Requirements document those alarms that are compliant are called Type A systems (see 3.1). Those that have made an informed decision NOT to take part are called Type B systems (see 3.6). The bulk of activations are the Intruder alarms, then it is the Hold Up alarms, then a very small number of CCTV systems.
If any such system has been issued with a URN, then it is a Type A, alarm and gets an Immediate police response. Those that declined to accept the police policy were classed as Type B alarms and it is for the keyholder to attend the scene first (in the 2018 document this was section 3.6.2, now section 3.6.3). If they witness what they believe to be criminal activity, then they are to contact the police who would attend a report of a crime. There are set conditions on the Type A alarm, namely it must be of a certain British and European Standard, fitted by a compliant company, whose staff had all been disclosure checked, sold to potential customers in a certain ethical manner, and if it had a certain number of false activations in a rolling 12 months period, then it is placed in a ‘Withdrawn’ status, and if the failure was not corrected it would eventually be placed in a Deleted status.
Crucially the compliant ARC cannot contact the police about the activation during this ‘Withdrawn’ period; it has fallen to the same status as the Type B alarms – a keyholder must attend, not the police. This is a crucial part of the policy as it ensures that the premise owners conduct correct training of their staff to prevent false activations and also any alarm sensor fault is immediately reported and corrected, to prevent another similar failure, thus risking being ‘Withdrawn’. These are stringent and onerous requirements to prevent such false activations, for no premise owner wishes it or their staff to be vulnerable through no police response.
By devising and applying this policy the NPCC author, currently the Chief Constable of South Yorkshire, working with a police initiative company called ‘Secured By Design’ (who write the policy for signing off by the author), ensure that police resources are effectively managed. It is crucial to understand that it is a policy of Risk Management, NOT Risk Avoidance; if it were the latter then in order to be fair to all, that would entail attending every activation that was reported to the police. All Chief Officers have agreed to this policy, published it on their website, and issue URN’s; crucially none have objected to its basic structure or principles. Although separate in their geographic nature, by strategically applying this policy, the intention is to bring about a realisation in the public and commercial businesses, many of a national nature, that irrespective where they reside or conduct business, in order to gain a police response to an activation they MUST have fitted a compliant Type A URN system, but that only works if all Chief Constables act in unison. The alarm companies are partners in the scheme, and many have taken that business risk to achieve the necessary compliance status in order to gain that potential remuneration from customers who wish to have fitted a URN alarm. The public have been given an informed choice on whether to fit a Type A system that will generate a police response to a sensor activation. Some may disagree, but since that information is published, it is both fair and ethical for the police to uniformly apply this policy of Risk Management. Those NPCC officers have fulfilled their function of managing their limited resources in an effective and nationally strategic manner.
Do they?
Through a dispute with one police force over its incorrect application I began to suspect that there was great disparity on how this policy was being implemented nationally and decided to apply to each constabulary in the country to check whether this policy was being uniformly, fairly and therefor ethically applied. Firstly I would say that one would think that after 24 years of being in existence, with constant regional meetings, bringing about updates to its correct application, and/or highlighting any individual failings, it could be expected by the public that it would by now be robust and fully in accordance with the policing ethics, highlighted earlier. The first indicator that something is wrong with this policy is that despite the Requirements placed on the alarm customer, with all the possible penalties, including being Withdrawn, leading to possible Deleted status, the policy author applies no checks on constabularies to ensure they are serving the public in the manner they have stated they will, namely not attend Type B alarms where only the keyholder would attend in the first instance (the policy says ‘a person at the scene’, which is invariably the keyholder in attendance). One would have thought that with all these potential and onerous penalties on the public that there would be at least a moral duty to also ensure constabulary compliance to the policy.
The Information Commissioner’s Office website outlines the original information to the public on the purpose of the Act, namely:
       "Openness is fundamental to the political health of a modern state. This White Paper marks a watershed in the relationship between the government and people of the United Kingdom."
       "Unnecessary secrecy in government leads to arrogance in governance and defective decision-making."
That Openness brings about Accountability through lack of Secrecy; if it does not exist then that Arrogance and Defective Decision Making prevails, and the watershed spoken of by the ICO will never occur in relation to this policy. The NPCC have placed those severe but necessary Requirements, with their accompanying punitive measures (of Withdrawn/Deleted status) on the compliant alarm companies and their customers; one would think they would recognise a duty in either law or morality, to ensure they effectively receive that published service.
Before I give the individual constabulary results of the Freedom Of Information (FOI) requests regarding this policy’s application I would add that it has been a murderous process to undertake. There is a requirement for all public bodies to respond within 20 working days to FOI requests. They can refuse to respond for a number of reasons, one being that the information requested would take too long and therefor cost too much to compile; that time limit is basically 18 hours; this is section 12 of the FOI Act.  This information retrieval would be simple, if the NPCC applied those checks I earlier spoke of, and they were consistent. These applications I undertook were anything but simple and after 6 months is still an ongoing piece of work, but now thankfully concluding. Virtually every constabulary used section 12 as a reason for refusal to supply the statistics, despite me asking for only the last 50 examples of application of the policy to Type B activations from non-compliant Alarm Receiving Centres. If the NPCC, as part of any constabulary participation had required each to collate such information, to: ‘… ensure that the general public experience consistent levels of service. …’ that they reassured the public of in the policy, then there would no issue; but there certainly was and still is one. Through my previous experience of police communications centre procedures and my knowledge of alarm activation procedures, by appeals both to the constabulary, then to the ICO, I slowly drew out some information that can now give a fairly clear national picture of the policy’s application, albeit at present not a complete one. I also stress that any inaccuracy through differing criteria constabularies have supplied me, and similarly through any small batch numbers, is the sole fault of the NPCC and not one of mine. Any Chief Officer who wishes to contest any conclusion, can contact me and supply a more accurate batch of figures, if we can agree the criteria, for I have certainly tried.
I will try and outline any differing issues for the reader to be aware of, to judge for him/herself on any meaning. Initially I asked for all Type B calls (they mainly come from non-compliant ARC’s and also calls from people hearing an alarm on the street, which would mean it had no URN, as no call was received from a compliant ARC). Following repeated refusals, I changed to apply for those calls from Non-compliant ARC’s only; it was no better, but I decided to remain with this criteria as if a constabulary were getting that right, then the rest would likely slot into place correctly AND it is these non-compliant ARC’s that are acting on behalf of their customers who have declined that informed choice to come under the umbrella of the NPCC Security Systems Policy.
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The Individual Constabulary Responses.
01 - Avon and Somerset Constabulary – Over three months they received 8 calls and after THRIVE was applied they attended all eight, a breach rate of 100%
02 - Bedfordshire Police – ‘THRIVE is applied to Type B alarms however we DO NOT routinely send officers. There would have to be aggravating factors involved to dispatch officers. (THRIVE + identifies the key considerations for evaluating any given situation, these being but not limited to, Threat, Harm, Risk, Investigation, Vulnerability, Engagement and Prevention and Intervention)’  They go on to say that in three months they attended no Type B alarms, a breach rate of 0%
03 - Cambridgeshire Constabulary – They share an alarm function with Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire and state: ‘We do not have calls into the FCR from non-compliant ARCs. Type B calls come from members of the public / witnesses to alarm activations rather than from ARCs. All such calls as assessed using THRIVE and dealt with appropriately based on this assessment. To assist, Cambs FCR have checked the last 10 such calls, these are classed as ‘Audible Alarm’. These were all subject to a THRIVE assessment and none were attended.’ I have to assume this to mean that the breach rate is 0%, although it is confusing as SOME calls have to be from non-compliant ARC’s, but attendance at no Audible only ones suggest a breach rate of 0%.
04 - Cheshire Constabulary – As a result of an appeal they then stated that they apply THRIVE to Type B alarms, then went on to say that: ‘Cheshire Constabulary do not attend Type B’s unless following the Thrive and NDA process has taken place, the call taker has been given no evidence from a person at the scene that a criminal offence is in progress which indicates that a police response is required.  We do not attend if we just get a call from a non-Complaint ARC stating that an activation has occurred.’ Although no actual figure has been given, their method of applying the policy, even with THRIVE, suggests a breach rate of 0%, but that is based on their word and NOT figures supplied.
05 - City of London Police – They failed to respond, but after a reminder they stated that they cannot supply data but that they applied THRIVE to all incidents, including Type B activations and attended all alarm calls, irrespective of Type A or B. I have submitted an appeal to the ICO as no figures were returned, but their response suggests a breach rate of 100%
06 - Cleveland Police – This was one of my first requests and Cleveland stated that they had 143 calls which included from non-compliant ARC’s over a 12-month period and they attended 49, making a breach rate of 34%. These will be both Audible only and Non-compliant ARC calls, the latter figure would likely be worse, if stood on its own.
07 - Cumbria Constabulary – I enquired over 3 separate 3 month periods and they stated: 55% breach in 2016, 29% in 2018(while I was there), 55% in 2019(I have redacted the reasons for this wide variance but it is enough to say there is an explanation). If we take the latter one that is a breach rate of 55%. This includes the ‘audible only’ alarms from members of the public so breaches of non-compliant ARC’s could be expected to be higher.
08 -Derbyshire Constabulary – Following an appeal Derbyshire confirm they apply THRIVE but are unable to supply any hard data. They state that they are: ‘…. able to confirm that the Constabulary conforms to the National Security System Policy unless, and following the application of THRIVE, there are other circumstances that indicate police attendance is required. This is unclear as it is THRIVE that causes attendance and has to be accepted as a failure to reply, beyond THRIVE being applied. (This I again put down to the NPCC’s failure to require statistical data on the correct application of the policy).
09 - Devon and Cornwall Police – They apply THRIVE and attendance is dependent on that assessment. Of 8 calls from non-compliant ARC’s over that period of time, they attended all 8, making a breach rate of 100%. This effectively means that their interpretation of THRIVE is it will always cause a response, even merely from a sensor activation only.
10 - Dorset Police – Dorset work in partnership with Devon and Cornwall, so once again, THRIVE has to be accepted as being applied causing a breach rate of 100%.
11 - Durham Constabulary – Following an appeal and an amended request they stated:
‘A review of all incidents opened with the code 331 returned 0 (zero) Non-URN Activations that were received from Non-Compliant Alarm Receiving Centres. As per the NPCC Policy, we do not action any non-compliant alarms. We only deal with compliant security companies.’  Although no calls seem to have been recorded from Non-compliant Arc’s, it seems clear that Durham apply the policy correctly and therefor have a breach rate of 0%.

12 - Dyfed-Powys Police – They stated they attend Type B activations, based on the THRIVE assessment. Of 10 calls they attended eight of them, giving a breach rate of 80%.
13 - Essex Police – This perhaps is best explained by letting their reply explain best of all the Essex Constabulary stance:
‘When the NPCC Response to Security Systems Policy was revised in 2018 the then Head of the FCR accepted the revised Policy and gave his full backing to the stronger advice in regard to calls from uncertificated alarm receiving centres requesting a response to Type B systems and should a Force Control Room Operator accept such a call and allocate a response they are required to justify their action. Calls from uncertificated non-compliant Alarm Receiving Centres attempting to pass intruder or personal attack alarms, are THRIVED but are then routinely rejected in accordance with the NPCC Policy. https://www.npcc.police.uk/documents/crime/2018/Security%20Systems%20Policy%202018.pdf
In order to assist FCR Operators we have flagged 59 telephone numbers known to be used by these companies with a warning to FCR Operators to remind them of the need for a URN before accepting the call and allocating a response. We seem to have identified the majority so far and it has not been necessary to add any further numbers in the last six months. A number of our operators when taking this robust stance were met with various demands with claims that we had a duty to attend. These incidents were in some cases followed up by the management of the facility demanding an explanation. The position taken by Essex Police has been extremely successful and non-compliant Alarm Receiving Centres appear to have understood.’
They went on to say:
‘During this period Essex Police registered 520 alarm calls and only find one where although the ARC was actually a certificated ARC they monitor an increasing number of non-compliant systems which obviously do not have URN’s, the call was rejected.’ Taking this it is clear that there is a breach rate of 0%. See my comments below in the Lancashire section.
14 - Gloucestershire Constabulary – My failure, I omitted them from my FOI’s.
15 - Greater Manchester Police – This is complicated by the inclusion of the airport, but they state:
‘Ordinarily a Type B Alarm call would not be deployed to. However, such reports could come via 999, 101 or Officer radio.
For the period 1st April to 30th June 2019 there was a total of 392 Type B Alarm incidents created. Of these 176 (45%) were attended – all reported via 101 or Officer radio. 999 calls were not deployed to.
Of the last 50 jobs (08:55 23/06/2019 to 23:52 30/06/2019) 27 (54%) were attended. Of these 25 were at the Airport & subsequently attended by Airport Officers & 2 were on District and the reports were received via Officer radio so the Officer was already at the scene.’
If we look at the last paragraph and exclude the airport, the two incidents where officers were the reporting source are understandable and excluded. It suggests that GMP in general follow the policy, although the earlier paragraph confuses this matter, so I applied no breach rate due to this.
16 - Gwent Police – Gwent refused to give details on the basis of time and cost. The matter is under appeal to the ICO. What response they gave stated: ‘Gwent Police apply NSSP and would not respond to type B Activations unless the THRIVE assessment indicates there is a potential Crime in Progress or person(s) at risk.’ It suggests that THRIVE may well alter the attendance.
18 - Hampshire Constabulary – They state that they DO NOT apply a further risk assessment of THRIVE. They are unable to supply actual figures but go on to state: ‘I can confirm that Hampshire Constabulary robustly follow the National Security System Policy and have no examples of this policy being breached by our force.’ As best as can be stated, this gives confidence that there is a breach rate of 0%.
19 - Hertfordshire Constabulary – They state that they apply THRIVE but cannot give statistics for Non-compliant ARC’s. They state: ‘We do not have calls into the FCR from non-compliant ARCs. Type B calls come from members of the public/witnesses to alarm activations rather than from ARCs. All such calls as assessed using THRIVE and dealt with appropriately based on this assessment. To assist Herts FCR have checked the last 10 such calls, these are classed as ‘Audible Alarm’. These were all subject to a THRIVE assessment and none were attended.’ This again is confusing as calls MUST at times be received from Non-compliant ARC’s, but in the absence of other information I have to accept this as a breach rate of 0%.
20 - Humberside Police – This was one of the first requests and was based on Type B’s, so would be Non-compliant ARC’s and Audible Only, from callers hearing an alarm activation. Over a period of a year they had 340 Type B calls and attended 280 of them. This is a breach rate of 83%. As earlier stated, the non-compliant ARC calls would most likely be higher.
21 - Kent Police – They refused on the grounds of time and cost to supply this information and it is currently under appeal to the ICO. **Note** They responded to the appeal, although I found the figures to be overexplained and therefore confusing. Not wishing to cause further work to the constabulary I decided to leave the matter, although it is enough to say that THRIVE is applied to the Non-compliant calls.
22 - Lancashire Constabulary – Lancashire were unable to supply statistics, but it is clear from the copy letters they supply that they conduct a robust application of the policy by not attending, with letters sent out when calls are received from these Non-compliant ARC’s. They also respond in a similar manner to the alarmed premise, informing them of the policy itself and how to gain a response. They go on to state: ‘We have identified a number of alarm companies (over 50) who are regular callers. We have the following message attached to those companies telephone numbers which states the following:
*PLEASE NOTE THIS NUMBER IS FOR - ………………………………. - AN UNCERTIFIED ALARM RECEIVING CENTRE THAT HAS CHOSEN TO OPERATE OUTSIDE THE NPCC/LANCASHIRE ALARM REQUIREMENTS. IF THERE IS NO URN QUOTED OR NO EXTENUATING CIRCS WE SHOULD NOT DEPLOY - EMAIL ALARMS ADMIN WITH LOG*’ Like Essex I will later comment on this. I am satisfied that Lancashire will have a breach of 0%. That said, well done Lancashire THAT is how it should be done, and along with Essex, is a shining torch to those that fail.
23 - Leicestershire Constabulary – They state that they apply THRIVE but calls from non-compliant ARC’s would not normally be attended, unless another factor increases the Risk Assessment. No such calls were recorded for 2019 giving a breach rate of 0%.
24 - Lincolnshire Police – Out of 15 calls from Non-compliant ARC’s, They attended 10 of them, thereby giving a breach rate of 67%. This is itself disappointing and surprising as *********. (I have redacted my comment beyond there is a clear link of association between the constabulary and ‘Secured by Design, who write this policy for alter ‘signing off’ by the NPCC author.)
25 - Merseyside Police – The request was sent on 4th September 2019. They refused all the information I requested. I appealed and they then sent some of the easier information, stating they applied a Risk Assessment to all calls to the control room. With regards to attendance to Type B activations, they stated: ‘The attendance (or not) of a Type B Alarm will be based on the information passed by the caller at that time and enquiries made from the reporting person at the scene that a criminal offence is in progress which indicates that a police response is required.’ They again refused to supply further actual attendance data based on section 12 of FOI Act. The matter was under appeal to the ICO and after their intervention, on 31.03.20, nearly 7 months after my request that should have taken one month only, I was finally supplied with information that better explained the attendance/non-attendance to Type B activations. Out of 64 they attended 59, making a breach rate of 92%. What chance has an ordinary member of the public got to ever obtain these statistics which are a terrible indictment on Policing Principles, especially Accountability? They never have, and if they do, they never can.
26 - Metropolitan Police Service – All 999 calls go through a THRIVE process. Out of 50 calls they attended 28 as Immediate Response, and 7 as Significant Response. 56% or 70% breach of Policy. As there are two levels of attendance let us take those Immediate Response, so there is a breach rate of 56%.
27 - Norfolk Constabulary – Although THRIVE is applied Norfolk attended no calls from Non-compliant ARC’s, giving a breach rate of 0%. They work in conjunction with Suffolk.
28 - North Wales Police – Although THRIVE is applied, of 4 calls from non-compliant ARC’s none were attended, giving a breach rate of 0%. (I have previously professionally met the Alarms Manager of North Wales and believe this to be very accurate).
29 - North Yorkshire Police – They apply THRIVE and out of 3 calls they attended all three, giving a breach rate of 100%.
30 - Northamptonshire Police – Refuse to supply any information and under appeal to the constabulary.
32 - Nottinghamshire Police – They apply THRIVE and out of 53 Type B (Non-compliant ARC’s and Audible only) incidents they attended 4, giving a breach rate of 8%. That is acceptable where management structures can address individual staff failings, as stated at 31) above.
33 - South Wales Police – South Wales confirm that they attend no alarm activations where there is no URN. A Breach rate of 0%.
34 - South Yorkshire Police – Again, like Merseyside, I sent an FOI on 4th September 2019 and they refused to supply the crucial statistics, quoting time/cost factors, applying section 12 of the FOI Act. However, they confirmed that they did apply THRIVE. Following an appeal they did supply some data, based on 10 calls. Crucially to the question I asked on Type B calls from non-compliant ARC’s, there were three calls from such, and all three were attended. There were two calls of CCTV, one was attended. I was not satisfied with this as their Chief Constable was the author of the policy and one would have expected him to have his ‘finger on the pulse’ and know how his constabulary applied his own policy. An appeal was submitted to the ICO and after an initially informal intervention by them, this eventually led to a discussion with the FOI department, followed by a similar one from the Temporary Superintendent of the Comms department. I then received an email to show that of 22 incidents of Type B calls from non-compliant ARCs, 15 were attended; again, like Merseyside that took until late March 2020, and hones in on the general public’s inability to ever obtain these figures to show compliance to the policing principles.  It was said that these non-compliant activations were risk assessed (or THRIVE’d) and that extra assessment showed justifiable reasons sitting outside the mere sensor activation, why they should be attended, despite the policy saying it required a ‘person at the scene’ to report it, usually the keyholder on attending. This gives a breach rate of 68%.
35 - Staffordshire Police – They confirm that they apply THRIVE and if 12 calls received, they attended 10 of them, giving a breach rate of 83%. Even if the other calls are accepted, there is still a significant breach rate.
36 - Suffolk Constabulary – They apply THRIVE and of 10 calls they attended 3, giving a breach rate of 30%.
37 - Surrey Police – They confirm that they apply THRIVE BUT apply the policy and of 10 samples checked, none were attended, giving a breach rate of 0%. They included Audible only calls, but the constabulary stress that they adhere to the policy. This is a breach rate of 0% but did not state a number for Non-compliant ARC calls.
38 - Sussex Police – After initially failing to respond Sussex say that they apply THRIVE, but wen on to say that they adhered to the NPCC policy. They further stated: ‘10 calls regarding Type B systems including audible only systems, have been checked and based on the information provided at the time of the call, officers were not deployed to any these calls.’ After a phone call to their FOI who himself had checked certain criteria I am satisfied that they follow the policy regarding Audible only systems ANF calls from non-compliant ARC’s. This gives a breach rate of 0%.
39 - Thames Valley Police – They apply a further Risk Assessment to Type B calls received and base attendance on that information. They state they follow the policy but have no means of supplying the information requested. This is unacceptable for where is the accountability to the public? It is a failing of the NPCC at a national level for that accountability should always be a key factor to any of its policies.
40 - Warwickshire Police – Work in conjunction with West Mercia (See below)
41 - West Mercia Police – They give details of 13 calls from Non-compliant ARC’s and attended 8 of them, giving a breach rate of 62%.
42 - West Midlands Police – They apply THRIVE and of 26 calls received they attended 22 of them, giving a breach rate of 84%.
43 - West Yorkshire Police – After two failures to respond and a threat if action from the ICO they stated they apply THRIVE and only if extenuating circumstances are present; ie., suspicious circumstances, intelligence on the address/location. That said they then state to attending non-compliant ARC calls: ‘In relation to 999 calls only, between 1st April 2019 to 30th June 2019 a total of 21 Alarm calls from TypeB alarm companies were recorded. A total of 17 of these calls were attended.’ This means virtually every incident has such circumstances to warrant attention, giving a breach rate of 81%.
44 - Wiltshire Police – They quote the policy and state that there were zero calls from non-compliant ARC’s. Although that is a 0% breach, it seems difficult to believe that no calls were from such ARC’s.
Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) – in the 3 months there were 16 Type B’s from non-compliant ARC’s and they attended 15 – a breach rate of 94%
Police Scotland - after appeal. Out of 51 Audible incidents, they attended 17 incidents, a breach of 33%. (They were unable to give figures for pure non – compliant ARCs, would likely be a higher figure.)
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The first question to ask is: ‘Did the NPCC achieve its 24-year-old goal of ensuring that the general public experienced consistent levels of service? It is blatantly obvious that they did not. To say that the above data is the best that they can achieve after over 24 years is a sad indictment on their leadership, management, and strategic planning capabilities; it is an abject failure of their duty to the public. I decided to question this further and sent an FOI request to the NPCC itself; in it I asked:
‘In order to: 'shape police responses to ensure the general public experience consistent levels of service' that is a clear indicator to there being a level of service identified and expected for each constabulary to ensure it achieves. Based on this document and specifically the section I have highlighted, I would ask a number of questions:
a) Is their such an identified police response level of service to Type A activation reports?
b)  Is their such an identified police response level of service to Type B activation reports? (I am aware these can be from a member of the public hearing an alarm, or a non-compliant Alarm Receiving Centre.)
c) Specifically, what is that level of service (identified by the NPCC) for Type A and Type B activations that each constabulary should ensure it strives to achieve in order to show it is complying with its own published policy (namely the national one)?
d) Are the Police Requirements above, Requirements or Guidelines? (It uses both terms, which causes confusion.)
e) Is this NPCC compiled document (for the public's knowledge in making informed decisions), founded in the Policing Ethics and Principles of: Honesty, Fairness, Openness, Integrity? (I expect this to have been fully considered and documented.)
For a) and b) they steer me to sections 3.1 and 3.6.2 of the (now older) policy, and for all other questions they state: ‘The NPCC does not hold recorded information captured by your request.’ This means that having required all constabularies to apply the policy consistently, after 24 years they themselves have no recorded information what that consistent level of service should be! To say that is bizarre is to put it mildly. They similarly cannot say if it is Requirements or Guidelines, nor even whether the document is founded in the Policing Principles! These are crucial points as *******, one constabulary I checked with has used the fact that they are ‘Guidelines only’ to justify their continued substantial breach, which they state they will continue to do, through the application of THRIVE. I would use the term ‘abuse of’. I decided to ask that failing constabulary the same questions, and this was refused on the grounds of being ‘vexatious’, which is basically making a request, for little or no other reason than the requestor just can, and for no justifiable reason. After assuring them that it was an issue of public interest, and it was my intention to inform the public, and having considered the questions and reduced them to a simple one on that national ‘consistent level of service’, and what that specifically meant to them in non-attendance or attendance to Type B alarms, they ‘specifically’ informed me:
'To achieve a consistent level of service ********* Constabulary use a risk-based decision-making model “THRIVESC and the NDM”.  This means that every incident is risk assessed based on the information available.  A decision on how to best deal with the incident is then made.  There is no “target” based approach to how many incidents of a specific nature we attend. The response to each incident will be based on risk assessments. There are however built in risk assessments within certain policies that will dictate police attendance automatically.'

Again, I don’t care if they do or don’t apply this further Risk Assessment (THRIVE or now THRIVESC), so long as they do it equally and fairly for the 2nd group on keyholder attendance only, namely those Type A alarms who have been made ‘Inactive’ and are therefore on that same attendance status. It is blatantly unfair to them to do otherwise and happens BECAUSE THERE IS NO PUBLIC ACCOUNTABILTY. Despite me pointing this out on a great number of occasions to *********, they ignore the three questions later set and are therefore Secretive, not Open, as they espouse in their Policing Principles. I have not asked other failing constabularies, for I know the response will be just the same, a failure to be Open and Accountable to the public they serve and are supposed to do so honestly. The Chief Constable of South Yorkshire, the policy author, could of course unequivocally now state, in the interests of clarity to the public and alarms industry, what that specific consistent level should be. I suspect however that this will remain forever unstated, for he fails, in his adherence to his open policy, based on the figures his own constabulary supplied. It is a travesty of Justice and a failure to the public, nationwide, not just South Yorkshire. As an example, according to that quoted failing constabulary, that ‘consistent level’ is wherever THRIVE leads them, and that (national) consistency, or inconsistency, is exposed by the failure of all those constabularies that do not have the courage to apply the policy, despite saying they do. I currently have this matter of ********* Constabulary failing to answer the question set correctly under appeal with the Information Commissioner and will update this matter when this is finalised.
If we return back to the Policing Principles and those responsibilities of Chief Officers, there has been an abject failure of the policy author and all those failing Chief Officers to the promotion of Openness and Accountability. Once exposed by those statistics I have tortuously obtained, both at a local and national level, the integrity of the NPCC and those failing chief officers in their own constabulary areas is dramatically called into question. The duties, or responsibilities, that the College of Policing specifically placed on the individual Chief Officers, bullet pointed above, have been ignored by the ones that have failed to ensure their policy is applied. Consider those security system users that have accepted the policy as fact, within the guidance the policy has given them, in order to achieve a police response to a sensor activation. Through that mis-information published by each failing constabulary, those users who have had too many false activations and whose system is in a Withdrawn status, their compliant ARC CANNOT now contact the police, so they get a worse service as those who have declined to take part (Type B systems). Those Type B systems are always being considered for attendance in the failed constabularies, through the application of THRIVE. It becomes obscene the closer a failing constabulary reaches a failure rate of 100%!  
Those failing Chief Officers need to ask three simple questions of themselves to decide on their stated high ethics:
1)     How can my constabulary apply a second Risk Assessment of THRIVE on the Type B alarms (who, despite having information to make an informed choice, never took part in the policy), not disclose that we are doing so, yet maintain our Openness, Honesty, Fairness, Integrity, and Accountability?
2)     Having applied this undisclosed Risk Assessment of THRIVE how can my constabulary cause the % deviation away from not attending Type B alarms (again who never took part in the policy) without telling the public about the scale of the breach it causes; in a significant number either approaching or even reaching 100%), yet maintain that we are acting with Openness, Honesty, Integrity and are Accountable?
3)     In applying THRIVE how can my constabulary apply it to Type B alarms (who never took part in the policy) who are supposed to be on a Keyholder attendance only, when those Withdrawn Type A alarms who have dropped to the same Keyholder Attendance only status, have been banned from contacting the constabulary, and therefor they cannot be equally THRIVED? How can I justify my assertion of Openness, Honesty and Fairness and state my constabulary is displaying Integrity?
The questions are unanswerable as the application of THRIVE causes clear and obvious severe breaches of Openness, Honesty, Fairness, and Integrity, yet has been allowed to occur over 24 years BECAUSE THERE IS NO ACCOUNTABILITY, WHICH IS CAUSED BY NO REQUIREMENT TO PUBLISH FIGURES TO SHOW HOW EACH CONSTABULARY ADHERES TO THE POLICY! That lack of Accountability results in the:
"Unnecessary secrecy in government leads to arrogance in governance and defective decision-making.",  
the ICO highlight on their website; they do so with good reason. If I am permitted to once stray into sarcasm I would say that any Chief Officer who needs advice on whether these issues addressed in the 3 questions above cause breaches in the policing ethics, I would advise them to attend the nearest playschool group and ask the first two year old they come across for their opinion. These failing Chief Officers require their staff to fully apply the policing ethics as they go about their duties or functions as they represent their constabulary, yet these high ranking officers do not apply those same standards to themselves, clearly now seeing their own principles as obstacles, to be circumvented. It is hypocrisy of the highest order, especially those who have been made aware of this breach and still fail to act, in order to address their own breach of their stated ethics; it is simply a deceit and the house of cards it is based upon falls down, when exposed. With the exception of one, all can perhaps say that they were unaware and have unwittingly migrated to this position; that one, over the last 18 months say that they have given this considerable thought and are satisfied that they can apply THRIVE, but have repeatedly refused to inform the public, nor answer the above three simple questions. It is a refusal to openly display that stated Accountability, it can be nothing else. I now attach a link to a Government document on Accountability. Although it speaks of Government, it is equally relevant to ANY public body that similarly is supposed to serve the public.
 The NPCC Security Systems Policy itself is one of a Risk Assessment yet THRIVE is a further Risk Assessment on a policy where Risk has already been managed. One is tempted to say that in effect, THRIVE seems to supersede the policy, so why have a policy at all? Just apply THRIVE to every call, and that is both ethical and fair. Again, THRIVE has been applied only over the last couple of years and these failing constabularies have always been attending these calls, irrespective of any THRIVE assessment; in short, they just cannot live with their perceived implications caused by their publication of their own policy. That said, the policy identifies those alarm activations that do not justify attendance through an objective test, or tests. The main one is the quality of the system, requiring a ‘sequential activation’ of a certain European Standard. This gets away from that instinct to attend everything, and only a VERY small percentage are genuine activations caused by criminal activity. These failing constabularies then apply THRIVE, which at best is subjective, and returns back to attending on instinct, as it is an activation and may just be a crime. It begs the obvious question: if THRIVE is to be so widely applied across the constabularies, then it is only Open to show that it is, by inserting it into the policy at section 3.6 AND require its monitoring; that would fulfil the policing principles.
Let us THRIVE it then: As stated above, only a VERY small percentage are crimes (and these are the robust URN ones), so that draw of police resources and ‘blue light’ attendance, is NOT justifiable, particularly when you take into account a constable’s primary responsibility of protecting life. Could you account for such a breach of the policy at an inquest following a fatal collision? At such high breach rates these failing Chief Officers are effectively saying that they disagree with the policy yet publish it and NEVER challenge it. By publishing they are saying they agree with it, but then effectively ignore it. That could not stand the forensic scrutiny of an inquest or criminal court, and communications centre inspectors need to be absolutely clear on that vulnerability, for it is them that authorise attendance, by a positive instruction or failure to address consistent breaches which occur on their watch. They need an instruction from their Chief Constable, who themselves must justify why they publish the policy, then ignore it through THRIVE. I do not doubt that there may be times, and these will or should be rare, where an assessment may be made that causes attendance, BUT it should be from one outside the scope of the Security Systems Policy. As an example, if a call were received of a Type B alarm activation and shortly before it occurring a person was recently seen acting in a suspicious manner in that area, then common sense would say to attend. What is actually occurring is that no such factors are occurring to cause attendance. I don’t accept South Yorkshire’s assurance that 15 of 22 incidents justified attendance for justifiable reasons, after THRIVE was applied; that should show in the figures of crimes found; ie., ‘15 attendances to Type B incidents, 15 crimes found to have been committed’. Since every other constabulary has a miniscule crime level at alarms, why is South Yorkshire’s so different in perceiving crimes are occurring from mere non-compliant alarms? The police are attending for no other factor than an alarm has sounded (see the 100% breaches), or because of the value of the property/contents, or the time of night, etc. All those factors were known to the premise owner when they decided not to apply for a URN alarm; other similar premise owners protected their property by obtaining a police policy compliant system, so the non-compliant premise owner should have too. The first responsibility to protect property lies with the property owned themselves, and they fail where they do not obtain a URN system. Incidentally, these companies who choose a non-compliant system can easily be identified by a walk down the High Street. Looking at premise alarms it is clear that all the (***redacted) shop chains choose this non-compliant means of alarm system ‘protection’. Similarly, (***three national chains redacted) also have non-compliant systems. No sympathy can be felt for such companies as their profits are vast, yet they choose these cheaper non-compliant options. Last year (**redacted) alone published profits of nearly 83 million pounds in 2018, (**redacted) profits for 2019 were £341 million.  The (**redacted) companies are similarly in the 100’s of millions profit brackets. They can hardly say they cannot afford compliant alarm systems. The term ‘you make your bed, then lie in it’ comes to mind.
Getting back to this THRIVE, if THRIVE is to be applied it should be similar to:
‘This alarm system is of an unknown British and European Standard, sold and fitted by a non-compliant company whose company and staff honesty and training are also unknown. Also, any repeated false sensor activations cannot lead to the non-compliant alarm being Withdrawn, as can result from compliant system activations. As such the Risk Assessment has already been completed within the NPCC policy, published on the constabulary website and the premise owner has made an informed choice not to come within the scope of the policy discipline. This is not suitable for police attendance. The caller has been advised to contact the keyholder in the first instance and if they witness what they believe to be a crime, to then contact the police.’
If however THRIVE were to be applied to cause attendance, then IT HAS TO BE APPLIED TO BOTH THE TYPE B AND THE WITHDRAWN TYPE A ALARMS. To apply it to the former, but not the latter, is grossly unfair, both being on the same ‘Keyholder attending’ status. IF however,  to be fair you apply it to the failed Type A alarms as well as the Type B ones you have scuttled your policy as there is no punitive measure for that failure, you have just given them another number to ring the police on, and that is 999! Still, there are enough failing Chief Constables that if they acted together could apply pressure to change the policy. However, as stated above, the problem then is that effectively you do not have a policy and no matter what the objections may be given, I cannot see that being applied. It once again simply comes down to this: There is a perfectly sound policy (in the principles and structure of its writing) that has been there for over 24 years BUT lacks that crucial Accountability. A significant number of constabularies (Essex and Lancashire are the shining examples) correctly apply it, why then can’t they all? Again, it is an issue primarily of Leadership, or the lack of it.
One of the greatest controversies is that of non-compliant CCTV activations and in a quotation from the FOI I submitted to the NPCC on this THRIVE application they stated that a senior officer there had stated, where a person reported witnessing someone on CCTV they would have difficulty in not responding. I understand that BUT if that is the case then it should be removed from the policy. Once again, URN’s are issued to CCTV alarms and they can be then made ‘Inactive’. To consider attendance to the non-compliant ones, and invariably doing so, is grossly unfair to any compliant systems that have been made Inactive, for they are on the same attendance status, but are not considered for attendance like the non-compliant ones. This point was used by ******** constabulary to justify the whole of their abuse of attendance to ALL calls from non-compliant ARC’s, resulting in a large breach, despite these controversial CCTV URNs accounting for a miniscule number. (The breach is significantly higher than that quoted, for it is masked by the ‘Audible Only’ calls received, which are usually not attended).
Personally, I left my employment as an Alarms Manager, due to the immoral position I found myself in and a failure of senior officers/managers to recognise their failings, despite trying to alter it for 10 months in employment, now over two years. In those two years those three simple questions have been continually asked of that constabulary, but they have never responded to them, for they cannot square the circle. In my discussions with other Alarms managers/staff in my requests for information, a number of others have expressed the same concerns. They of course have careers to build, mortgages to pay, and families to care for; therefore, they cannot raise their concerns sufficiently to address the intransigent attitude of their senior managers and NPCC officers. As an example, take the position I have encountered, whereby the senior communications centre senior officers were intransigent, the legal team and Professional Standards Team displayed severe failings in understanding a policy and more seriously, failing to understand the application of simple Policing Principles. These are not difficult words, Honesty, Fairness, Openness, Integrity, Accountability. I of course, needed none of these career issues and am beyond my policing development and merely looked to contribute further to the constabulary and community by doing a good job of work and earn a small amount of remuneration for ‘pleasures’. Unfortunately, I CAN read a policy and understand the principles of applying it, despite perceived problems it may cause; ‘challenges’ is the usual NPCC word.
When you holistically view this, it is clear the policy is not fit for the purpose it is intended (through that lack of public Accountability), despite those 24 years of ‘fine tuning’. All these failing Chief Constables surely cannot be getting it so wrong after such an extended period to understand the policy? It appears that they want to have their cake and eat it, or put another way, have a policy to reduce demand on calls for service yet consider attending all alarms that are passed via 999 from non-compliant ARC’s to their communication centres(which they invariably do so). Clearly, they just cannot live with saying, ‘No’ to the non-compliant ARC calls and use THRIVE to justify their failing. It is the job of the non-compliant ARC caller to use emotive language and persuade the communications centre call handler that they should send a response. They will speak of the surety that this is a burglary, for one reason or another and/or that the alarm is a sequential system. The call handler will be in a quandary, in the knowledge that they will surely face criticism IF it is later found to be a crime. They need the full support of effective and brave management to state that the policy will be followed and to merely ask for a URN, nothing else, and inform the non-compliant ARC caller of the policy (which they know better than the police comms handler) and to send a keyholder; in short, hold to the policy. This failure to effectively manage the policy leads to a justifiable concern that trust cannot be placed in the NPCC author (perhaps the NPCC themselves), nor ‘Secured By Design’, to alter the policy so that it can work effectively in the correct interests of the public(through that Accountability), which should always be the police goal. With ‘Secured By Design, I have passed my evidenced concerns to them and they have merely chosen to ignore me, despite, or perhaps because, I am the only person in those 24 years to highlight this significant failing on their part. I have no confidence in their ability to address this matter at best they are burying their head in the sand and continue to do so.  It is my belief that this is something for the Policing Minister to be made aware of, and address. How can he be asked for extra resources when those that the Chief Officers already have are being wasted? If it is happening with this area of policing, what other areas also need highlighting? The police compete against other public bodies for those finite government funds with the Health Service and Education Service both needy and worthy departments.
I would personally only be satisfied if Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabularies and Fire & Rescue Service (HMICFRS) conducted an inspection of this policy application and reported on it, with an ability to then highlight the failing constabularies and require improvements. In future, figures should be required of every constabulary and those that passed scrutiny, with near zero policy failures and management structures that challenged individual breaches by staff with re-training and monitoring of those staff members, those constabularies could be exempted for a period of say 3 or 5 years. Those that breached the policy by a substantial amount should be addressed by requiring the Chief Constable to correct those clear failings AND if they continued to misinform the public, they should then have the ability to advertise that they apply the policy, to be withdrawn from their organisation. Those somewhere between should again be required to improve and be continually reassessed, until they achieved that near zero failure tier.
For these failing chief officers’, it appears that they do not apply their own high ethical standards to themselves. It leaves them open to an allegation of hypocrisy, for none of their stated high ethics they require of ALL their staff can be applied to their NPCC National Security Systems Policy application. They urgently need to redress this and state to their management team:
'Apply my Policing Ethics and irrespective of any concerns, those ethics are my tenets of policing and are NOT to be breached under ANY circumstances. Any issue of perceived conflict or serious concern should be raised for a decision to be made by myself.'
They should recognise these ethics as underpinning EVERYTHING their staff do in terms of decision-making and policing actions they take. Chief Constables have a further duty to three clear groups with regards to this policy:
1.      The public, from the (at best) inaccurate information that the constabulary pass to them, meaning they are unable to make an 'informed choice'.
2.      The Communications Centre staff, who if they apply the C.C.’s published policy are criticised when a burglary indeed has occurred, leading to an attitude of self-protection, so mark logs to attend everything. (We have all felt the criticism of that system, when scrutinised by senior officers the next morning, including each C. C. as a young in-service PC).
3.      The Alarms staff who are given the role profile of applying and advising on the policy but are then expected to do anything other than correctly and ethically apply it, in those failing organisations. They make failing alarms Inactive while they read the incident logs of attendance to a substantial number of non-compliant alarms, particularly the commercial ones (in some cases ALL of these 999 calls).
What right does any failing chief constable have to bring Police Regulation proceedings against any officer for any breach of the Policing Principles when they cannot keep to these themselves? They instinctively know this as they will never inform the public of this second Risk Assessment application and its effect on the policy the public believe they have made that ‘informed choice’ on. The first weapon any constable fights crime with is Honesty, for without that there is no public confidence in his/her Office. That applies equally from the student officer up to and including the Chief Constable.
On that issue of risk, the police have managed risk; they have shut police stations the length and breadth of the country and have understandably justified such closures on the basis of an acceptable risk. They have also reduced Crime Scene Investigators from attendance at lower level crimes through the night, getting police officers to try and protect forensic evidence as best they can so that it can be inspected in the morning, losing that continuity and possible evidence to weather or other factors. This is based on the efficient use of the police budget in providing excellent policing, but based on the budget they have available to fulfil all the calls for service from all requirements of our society; I fully support them in these difficult decisions on factors of service and risk. Where the Compliant ARC alarm activation Immediate Response calls cause longer attendance times they can say, ‘we just missed catching them’ and show that at least they tried, but with an alarm activation that falls outside their policy requirements they feel they cannot bring themselves to explain why they chose not to attend, and so deploy to them also. Well done Essex and Lancashire, who are the forefront of good practice in the ethical way they apply the policy, and make it work correctly. If all followed these champions in the policy application then that stated ‘consistent level of service’ would have been achieved many years, if not decades ago. It still remains as a terrible indictment on the NPCC’s ability to apply a national strategy to achieve a stated goal. It should be South Yorkshire constabulary who is that champion, but sadly languishes in this regard.
There should be either the courage to follow ethically the policy principles, or courage to inform the public of the 2nd Risk Assessment and its subsequent effect, but there is neither.
Each failing Chief Constable has to accept that they have 2 years of hard work to embed this procedure into the consciousness of their public and those failing constabularies have not yet begun that arduous, but necessary process. It is said at regional alarm manager meetings that it cannot be understood why more companies fail to take up and abide by the URN system. It really isn’t rocket science; where constabularies fail, they make that ‘take up task’ more difficult to embed in EVERY constabulary, as many are national companies and are invariably getting a service to non-compliant systems.
(**Since writing this document, the new ECHO (Electronic Call Handling Operations) should have been in place, but due to the COVID 19 Pandemic, this has understandably been delayed. It is designed to cut out the police control-room call handler, thus speeding up the sending of a vital resource to a Compliant (URN) activation. The alarms industry has invested a great deal of time and money into its development and are under the false belief that it will remove the subjectivity still further; it should, but it will not! Why? Because nothing prevents the call from a non-compliant ARC being received and THRIVE, that undisclosed secondary risk assessment (that Inactive URN’s cannot equally benefit from, despite also being on Keyholder attendance only), will still be applied by those failing constabularies, due to the lack of moral courage by those failing constabulary NPCC officers.**)
I have a number of suggestions on how to move this policy positively forward to but what is fundamentally missing from it is that ‘…… consistent level of service…..’. The policy, after 24 years (as the quote from the NPCC shows and I suspect the same would be from every one of the failing constabularies), should actually state what that service should be, ie., a zero or near zero breach, for only then does it hold to the Policing Principles. This may seem too prescriptive but look what that failure to provide that direction has resulted in; remember, 24 years!
To work in an Alarms Department in these failing constabularies is to be handed nothing more than a poisoned chalice and any alarms staff member who cannot work within that hypocrisy is being driven towards being constructively dismissed, these failing Chief Constables need to be VERY careful of that allegation.
May I take this opportunity to remind ALL chief constables of the College of Policing direction to every one of them and this is especially true of the policy author, the South Yorkshire Chief Officer:
1.2 Statutory basis of the Code
1.2.1 The College of Policing has issued the Code of Ethics as a code of practice under section 39A of the Police Act 1996 (as amended by section 124 of the Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014).
1.2.2 As a code of practice, the legal status of the Code of Ethics:
a). ........
b). relates specifically to chief officers in the discharge of their functions.
Chief officers 1.4.3 
As the head of your force or organisation you will: 
  •  show by personal example how the principles and standards in this Code apply. 
  •  promote, support and reinforce ethical behaviour at all times. 
  •  show moral courage to do the right thing even in the face of criticism. 
  •  be consistent in what you do and say. 
  •  promote openness and transparency within policing and to the public.
  •  promote fairness and equality in the workplace
  •  create and maintain an environment where you encourage challenge and feedback. 
  •  be flexible and willing to change a course of action if necessary 
This policy I regard as the single greatest breach of public trust on the part of those officers who charge their staff with upholding, through the application of their Policing Principles; namely the National Police Chief’s Council themselves. Openness, Honesty, Fairness, Integrity, Accountability, where are those qualities displayed by the NPCC here? Measured against those principles, its application by those failing chief constables is obscene to suggest they are applied, in reality, it is a deceit and the house of cards collapses if the Accountability is addressed; sadly I fear it never will be.
******************
For Compliant Alarm Companies and/or their Customers
I can understand the desire of any compliant alarm company being reluctant to make a complaint against their own constabulary, concerned that it may put them in a bad light by that service. This is something that each company must consider, otherwise this abuse will continue, as it has already done for the last 24 years. I would suggest the asking of a simple question on receipt of a ‘Warning’ or ‘Withdrawn’ letter, and that is:
'We have received a 'Warning/Withdrawn' letter from the constabulary concerning the Alarm URN *****. If withdrawn(or warned it may be), and placed on the same attendance status as those alarms that never took part in the NPCC Security Systems Policy and therefore have no URN, can you confirm that this Withdrawn system will be treated equally, namely neither will achieve any response? If that is not the case, why are the two systems now on the same attendance status, being treated differently in that one is considered for attendance (no URN) and other is banned from contact (Inactive URN), when the policy states that both equally require someone at the scene to report criminal activity?
We as a company, for ourselves and on behalf of our customer, look forward to your early response'
It is a perfectly reasonable question and if not answered, it can be a request submitted as a Freedom Of Information request. If asked through the Alarms Administration who sent the original letter, a request to forward the matter to the FOI department would bring about a legal requirement to respond under the FOI Act. Such a request would hone the minds of the senior managers (NPCC, whose policy this is) of the constabulary and would be duty bound to answer it in a manner that displays that Fairness, contained in their Policing Principles, that sadly they have not to date fulfilled. I have attached my email address for any assistance you may require.

Ray Greenhow.
**Footnote**. Since writing this the COVID 19 pandemic struck the world it even put this abuse of public trust in the police, in some perspective. That said, the lockdown has ended, and to now leave this until the crisis ends would make these figures far less relevant due to time factors alone. Here we have a large proportion of the police service, on a national level, wasting vital resources on alarm activations they have identified as not to be attended, yet they attend. They are now so desperate for resources that they have taken the unheard-of step (certainly since WWII) of asking for retired officers to volunteer to return to assist them through this staffing crisis. Also to be considered by the police is the aftermath that will follow this pandemic; that will be the worst recession we will have known in our lifetime, with the police numbers likely to be further reduced and more involvement in other roles as other services contract, and the police ‘pick up’ those incidents which those services can’t cope with. Still constabularies waste time, risk safety, and pour stress on stretched officers through a failure by police managers to do just that, manage.

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