Recommendations - Greater Manchester Police, December 2020

Greater Manchester Police · Ref: 2019/129807

Recommendation date: 17 December 2020

Response due: 11 February 2021

Published: 4 March 2021

Corruption and abuse of power

An investigation into a complaint made about a Greater Manchester Police (GMP) Police Community Support Officer's contact with a 12/13 year old girl via social media. He met the girl through a primary school 'cadet' scheme.

View on IOPC website

Recommendations (3)

Recommendation 1 Accepted

Recommendation

The IOPC recommends that GMP update their policies on the use of personal social media to reinforce to officers and staff that using personal social media to contact members of the public they have met through their work or duties … Read more

Force Response

Accepted action: The Media and Social Media Communications Policy and Procedure has been re-written in October 2020 and is with the Assistant Chief Constable for approval and sign off. PSB were one of the stakeholders who initiated the re writing … Read moreAccepted action: The Media and Social Media Communications Policy and Procedure has been re-written in October 2020 and is with the Assistant Chief Constable for approval and sign off. PSB were one of the stakeholders who initiated the re writing of the document and have been a key contributor to the policy throughout having consulted with the staff within the PSB for their thoughts and feedback. It is acknowledged that the previous policy lacked detail particularly around the personal use of social media and what was permitted.The new policy is now much more detailed with dedicated sections including;Official Corporate, official group, official other, individual professional or individual personal accounts. To emphasise the issue and dangers around contacting members of the public they have met through their work, section 5.17.3 of the report, under "key principles" includes a section which states; •Individuals should never contact a victim or witness through their own social media accounts. This includes personal-professional and personal-individual accounts. Doing so crosses the boundary between work and personal life and could give false or misleading messages to that person. Officers accused of serious corruption within the police in cases of abuse of position for sexual purpose often started their campaigns to target vulnerable persons by contacting them in this way. As has been recommended in the IOPC report, the dissemination of this policy is a key priority to ensure that the workforce with the organisation are completely clear around their use of social media. Education has already started on this with inputs being given by the branch's Organisational Learning team to the new student officers on day three of them joining GMP where amongst other important messages, their use of social media is one that we put a very strong emphasis on. We are also providing inputs to the newly promoted Sergeants courses where we are emphasising the perils of misuse of social media and requesting that they take this message away from the input and cascade it to their staff via briefings and one to one discussions. How GMP communicates key messages to staff is an ongoing action at the forces Strategic Organisational Learning Board that is chaired by the Deputy Chief Constable. This issue was raised at a recent board where the DCC gave head of Corporate Communications an action to produce a full Communications plan around learning within the organisation. Some of the suggestions being muted are a monthly learning bulletin similar to what is produced by the IOPC and a top 10 themes for learning which will feature prominently on the force's intranet page as well as being disseminated at briefings and Continuous Personal Development events. Show less

Recommendation 2 Accepted

Recommendation

The IOPC recommends that GMP ensure that officers and staff working with children in any capacity are aware of the appropriate communications channels and that contact with a child via social media is never appropriate. This follows an IOPC investigation … Read more

Force Response

Accepted action: GMP has a responsibility to protect and promote the safety and wellbeing of everyone involved in the VPC, both online and offline. Therefore, it is important to ensure all staff and volunteers involved in the VPC are aware … Read more

Recommendation 3 Awaiting Response

Recommendation

The IOPC recommends that the Police Staff Council strengthen the Standards of Professional Behaviour (September 2008) in respect of ‘Authority, Respect and Courtesy’ to make it explicit to police staff that they should not establish or pursue an improper sexual … Read more