Last week, the Leapwise team attended this year’s APCC-NPCC Summit (you can read our takeaways here). There was a lot of attention – understandably – on PCCs and other high-profile topics. But for me, the backdrop to the Summit was a broader, wide-ranging sense of a criminal justice system in crisis.
Across policing, justice and public safety, money is exceptionally tight. We are, in truth, in a period of austerity with prisons, courts, policing and probation all near the back of the long queue for scarce public funds. High profile failings – from prison escapes to misconduct scandals – are symptoms of systems under strain and in need of significant cultural change. And many of the solutions are either unknown or so politically unpalatable that they may as well be.
At Leapwise, we’ve been striving to make progress on these incrementally over the last five years. And our track record – from Avon and Somerset to Norfolk and Suffolk – has been real improvements for our partners. But it’s clear that even more radical action is needed. We want to be at the centre of thinking about what those changes might be.
Our new Policing, Justice and Public Safety Advisory Council
It’s for that reason that we’re launching our new Policing, Justice and Public Safety Advisory Council today. We want to work with them in three main ways:
- Getting their advice on how we can scale all the improvements we’ve been delivering locally in our sector areas – whether through supporting a wider set of local organisations, shaping national programmes, or developing tools and software.
- Supporting a more radical conversation about reform – bringing together leaders across our sector areas (and beyond) to consider new solutions and then build coalitions around them to deliver major change.
- Equipping our Leapwise team to be even more effective – coaching our service areas leads to work effectively with different clients and quality assuring some of our most complex and challenging work.
In Serena Kennedy KPM DL, former Chief Constable of Merseyside Police, and Scott McPherson, former Director General responsible for Police and Fire services in the Home Office, we have a formidable first two advisers on our Council. They will be joined in the very near future by a third member of this group.
Our service areas
As readers may know, Leapwise have recently launched three main service areas that clarify the offer we make to clients and the impact we try to have. We’re aligning our Advisory Council members with those directly to ensure we can do even more to make a difference.
Our People and Culture work – led by Dr Tanvi Bhatkal – will be supported by Serena Kennedy. The fundamental challenge we see here is understanding how to create high performing inclusive cultures across policing, justice and public safety. We’re focusing on how to deliver this even in organisations where pay is moderate, jobs are fiendishly complex, and risk management is the primary incentive.
Our Policy and Partnerships work – led by me – will be supported by Scott McPherson. The fundamental challenge here is working across organisational boundaries. No single agency can deliver the Safer Streets ambitions to halve knife crime or VAWG, and both central and local actors aren’t yet in the right place to collaborate effectively on these priorities.
Our Strategy and Transformation work – led by Valeria Illies – will be supported by our forthcoming third advisory council member. The fundamental challenge here is productivity. With funds tight and a vicious cycle of spiralling demand pressures, reshaping how organisations work and delivering efficiencies at pace is more essential than ever.
You’ll hear much more about our work in each service area – including with our Advisory Council – over the coming months. We’re excited to make a difference in each of them and want to work with partners, leaders, and innovators to solve these problems.
So, if you want to learn more or work with us, please click the button below. We’d be delighted to have a conversation with you about the future of policing, justice and public safety.