(2.00 pm)
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Yes, Mr Jay.
MR JAY
The next witness, please, is Ms Norgrove. MS JULIE ALISON NORGROVE (affirmed) Questions by MR JAY
MR JAY
Your full name, please?
A. Julie Alison Norgrove.
Q. Thank you. Can I ask you please to turn up a copy of your witness statement, dated 29 February. It's signed by you under a standard statement of truth. Is this your formal evidence to the Inquiry?
A. Yes, it is.
Q. You are currently the director of audit risk and assurance, providing the internal audit service for the MOPC, and before that, at least from 1 October 2009, you were the equivalent director of the MPA; is that correct?
A. It is. I should also say that I am now the head of audit for the Metropolitan Police Commission as well.
Q. Thank you. You took over, I believe, from Mr Tickner, who we've heard some reference to in this Inquiry; is that right?
A. I did.
Q. In terms of the law, this is somewhat complicated but it's clearly set out in your statement that following new legislation, both the MPS and the MOPC have audited body status and therefore fall under the Audit Commission Act. The consequence of that, or the role of internal audit, you explain in paragraphs 10 and following of your statement, I believe. Could you briefly summarise it for us, please, Ms Norgrove? This is our page 13101.
A. I think I have a slightly different numbering to the actual difference in the statutory approach now under the MOPC, in essence, the change meant that previously the Metropolitan Police was not an auditory body, it was the MPA itself, and that's why the audit service sat within that functionality. With the introduction of the Act, that has now changed and the Met is an auditory body, as is the MOPC, and therefore both are required to have an effective audit service.
Q. Could you define, please, the relevant audit service for the MOPC on the one hand and the MPS on the other?
A. Both will receive an effective audit service to meet the professional standards that I am bound to adhere to.
Q. So it's your directorate which is responsible for the audit responsibility in relation to both entities?
A. Yes, it is.
Q. Internal audit, as you explain this now is paragraph 12 is an assurance function that provides an independent and objective opinion to an organisation on the control environment by evaluating its effectiveness in achieving the organisation's objectives. So this is really a corporate governance and standards issue, is that in epigrammatic terms more or less what you do?
A. Yes, it's giving opinion really on how well the organisation manages its risks to achieve its objectives and to ensure that in doing so they use their resources efficiently and effectively.
Q. Presumably there are nation-wide standards by which risks and management are assessed?
A. Yes.
Q. You say in paragraph 16 that the work of the relevant directorates was "overseen and supported by the MPA's Corporate Governance Committee". So is this an extra layer of supervision?
A. It's recognised best practice that you should have an audit committee in place, which is essentially what the Corporate Governance Committee is. Just to give that additional assurance around the risk and control environment and myself and the external auditor would actually report to it on a regular basis.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
So do I understand this: the control of the organisation is within the hands of the organisation, that's the Commissioner for the Met and presumably the Deputy Mayor for the MOPC. They're responsible for control. You then create structures whereby you can assure yourself that appropriate checks and balances are in place in relation to use of money and other aspects of corporate governance, and then the Mayor's Corporate Governance Committee checks that actually the way in which you've approached your job fits their understanding of your remit? Is that fair?
A. Yes. It would be for me as the head of audit to determine the strategic approach so that I could give the Commissioner and the MOPC assurance around how well they're managing their risks, and I would then report that in to what is now actually the audit panel under the new arrangements and they would give assurance to the Commissioner and to the MOPC.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
But does your audit panel that's in the Mayor's office, is it?
A. It's within it's actually a joint audit panel because that was what was recommended.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
That's actually the question I was trying to get to.
A. I'm sorry.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Who sits on that panel, if it's part Met and part Mayor's office?
A. The audit panel itself is independent. It's not made up of representatives from the Met or from the MOPC. In fact, the guidance would advise against that, so it is truly an independent joint audit panel.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Appointed jointly then?
A. Yes.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
All right.
MR JAY
You explain in paragraph 19 that when you arrived, you sought to adopt a greater focus on a risk-based approach to your work, and you identify five key strategic approaches or objectives, and those are listed in paragraph 19. Does that summarise the position?
A. Yes.
Q. And one of them was conducting risk-based audits. When we look at what you did in relation to the MPS's gifts and hospitality arrangements and policies, does that come within the first of these bullet points, namely risk-based audit, or does it overlap some other of these points?
A. No, that would be a risk-based audit.
Q. Review of risk management, does it fall within that at all or not?
A. It would inform your opinion on risk management, but the risk management review that's referred to there is looking at the corporate risk process, specifically.
Q. As part of your functions, as you say in paragraph 20, you draw up an annual audit plan, which presumably covers everything within the corporate governance of both the MPA and the MPS, does it?
A. The yes. And now the MOPC and the MPS.
Q. Yes. Paragraph 22 now, page 13104, you say: "Over the past eleven years, internal audit has compiled a database of approximately 200 systems (gifts and hospitality being one of them) that need to be audited." So this is but a small part of a much wider activity you're conducting, isn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. Can you explain, please, paragraph 23: "The MPS gifts and hospitality system was consistently categorised as medium risk by internal audit. It's been subject to audit review five times in the past 11 years." So presumably there's low, medium and high risk, so we're falling in the middle, and when we're looking at risk, is this risk to the organisation, risk to the public or risk to something else or a combination of all of them?
A. It is generally risk to the organisation in achieving its objectives.
Q. And would matters such as reputational risk and the perception of harm be accommodated within that concept or not?
A. When we're actually determining what we need to do in looking at the annual programme, we will look at the one of the areas would be sensitivity and in that we do need reputational risk.
Q. In seeing where we are on the scale, this is the application of the national standard which I think you referred to earlier, is it? So you apply such a standard and you see how many points you score, and if you score a certain number of points, you're either low, medium or high, is it as simple as that?
A. That's not necessarily a national standard, but that would be recognised best practice.
Q. Thank you. Gifts and hospitality in particular, where your evidence starts at paragraph 29 on this issue, page 13105. You make the point there: "There is no separate policy or arrangements governing hospitality between the MPS and the media Is that simply an observation or are you suggesting that that may be a problem or an issue which could be addressed?
A. No, that's just a statement of fact.
Q. Carrying out the reviews, because you've told us there were five reviews over the course of the relevant period this is paragraph 30 you: review the governance arrangements for dealing with offers of gifts and hospitality on the basis of the risk approach. The audit reviews involved evaluating the adequacy and effectiveness of the MPS internal control framework in place in dealing with offers of gifts and hospitality." So you're looking at this really in terms of the system and the structures rather than
A. Yes.
Q. individual cases?
A. Yes.
Q. We're going to summarise some of this and look at other parts in more detail. The first review was in 2001, and the report was promulgated on 2 January 2002. You provide the copy which is at tab 78. We're not going to look at it. Your summary faithfully sets out the findings of that review. But 14 recommendations were made, 13 of which were accepted by the MPS, and you know the one which was not accepted was one which the HMIC has recommended in its report recently?
A. Yes.
Q. There's a certain irony there. What happened next was that the MPS, having accepted your recommendations, then go about implementing them, and the MPA audit panel monitors that implementation, is that what happened next?
A. Yes. In particular, those that were considered to be high risk.
Q. As you say in paragraph 32, the chair of the audit panel wrote to then Assistant Commissioner Mr Hogan-Howe, pointing out that three high risk recommendations had not in fact been implemented. We can see these, I think, from tab 79. Page 13203. They fell, some of them did at least, within the issue of gifts and hospitality.
A. Yes.
Q. I think all three recommendations related to that. The upshot was that Mr Hogan-Howe was invited to attend a meeting to give an explanation, and that meeting was on 27 March 2003, and Mr Hogan-Howe apologised for the fact that the recommendations had not been implemented?
A. Yes.
Q. We're now on paragraph 33. The follow-up audit of the first review, which is the 2002 review, was conducted in May 2003. It's tab 81. Again we're not going to look at it. 12 of the 14 recommendations that had been made had been implemented, and as we know, 13 had been accepted. The recommendation that was not implemented by the MPS was one which related to including the gifts and hospitality obligations in a personal guide issued to all officers and staff, but then you were informed that that would happen by the end of the summer of 2003, so so far so good.
A. Yes.
Q. Then I think there is a hiatus until 2006/2007, when a further audit was conducted. Is it usual that there would be this sort of three-year gap in time as we see here? It may be because the recommendations had all been implemented, well, then there's a period of quiet before you look into it again? Have I correctly understood it?
A. The principle would be, as this was a medium risk system, that we would look to review it twice in a five-year period.
Q. Thank you. You carried out a further audit, and the report is at JN8, which is tab 82. Again to summarise it, the overall opinion was that the control framework itself was adequate, but there were a number of controls that were not operating effectively and improvements in implementing the framework were acquired. In the end, I think there were 15 recommendations and the MPS agreed all of them, and one of them was that the Chief Executive of the MPA was to review the Commissioner's and Deputy Commissioner's gifts and hospitality register every six months?
A. Yes.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
I think there were 16 recommendations actually.
MR JAY
I lost one.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
I'm merely looking at 13221: "The management have accepted all 16 recommendations."
A. It was actually I think 15 for the MPS and one for the MPA, so that was the distinction.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
There you are, all right.
MR JAY
Okay. So there again, because this was medium risk, because all the recommendations seemed to be addressed, there would understandably be a further period of time when nothing would necessarily happen, and you say in paragraph 36 that in 2008 and 2009, this was independently of this review process, the directorate commented on the MPS's proposed revised policy and procedure in relation to gifts and hospitality. Can you tell us the context of that? Why were you invited to or did you decide to comment on the revised policy?
A. It would have been actually that we would have been invited to. As a consequence of a number of the recommendations that were made in the previous report, they did actually relate to making improvements to the policy and I think the director at the time just wanted us to have a look at that policy before they published it.
Q. You refer to an email, which is at tab 83, page 13238. Can I just understand this, that the reference to the target date for the implementation of the recommendations being 31 December 2007, was that referable to the 15 recommendations we were looking at as part of the 2006/2007 review?
A. Yes.
Q. So there was concern, well, there's been some delay here?
A. Yes.
Q. Thank you. In paragraph 37: "In March 2009 a report was submitted to the CGC Remind me what that's an acronym for.
A. That's the Corporate Governance Committee that performs the audit panel function. We changed its name in 2004.
Q. Oh right. by the MPS director of human resources in relation to amendments to be made to the operating procedure. The report stated that the MPS's review of their gifts and hospitality policy was prompted by two things." One of them is a statutory requirement and secondly the policy needed to be "more explicit in its application and should incorporate the giving as well as the receiving of corporate hospitality". The policy had not been reviewed since 2003 and 2004. So the concern or issue here was that there had been some period of time, five or six years, between the policy and the review of that policy?
A. Yes, I think the Met decided it was time that they needed to review the policy.
Q. Was that something that you, pursuant to your auditing role, would have some influence over, in other words apparent delay in reviewing policy, or was this something for the Met to deal with it?
A. In fact I think the review that we conducted earlier did actually say that the policy hadn't been reviewed for some time.
Q. As you say in paragraph 38, the revisions took effect in January 2009, and these included the introduction of hardback or electronic gifts and hospitality registers and review of entries in the registers, and indeed it's true from what the Inquiry has seen that there was a shift over to an electronic system at about that time. Can I move forward to paragraph 40, the minutes of the CGC meeting on 23 March 2009, at which the report was considered. This is the report you refer to in paragraph 8. It showed that members noted a number of things which apparently gave rise to concern. Protocols around alcohol were vague. Can you recall what the issue was there?
A. I can't recall the exact issue. I think it may have been that there was a reference in the giving of corporate hospitality that alcohol may be provided, but there wasn't anything more detailed than that.
Q. The report itself doesn't really help us on this?
A. No.
Q. This is page 13266. There were a series of concerns which are recorded as seven bullet points. Then you record this: "Other members felt the SOP should not be too prescriptive and should provide the capacity to exercise discretion." That presumably reflects a difference of view within the relevant committee, doesn't it?
A. Yes.
Q. The upshot in paragraph
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Would it be fair to say these are all obviously very important features, but this was not high on the risk analysis that you would do, was it?
A. No.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
I mean I notice, just looking at the minutes of the meeting which make this point about gifts and hospitality, the next item on the agenda was the use of business credit cards. One would have thought that was a rather higher problem in orders of magnitude.
A. Yes, it certainly was at the time, yes.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
So one has to put the context around how you're talking about all these areas.
A. Yes.
MR JAY
I think what happened is that, as you say in paragraph 41, it was agreed the CGC would acknowledge the progress made, but it couldn't endorse the report. A further report was requested, and that was produced on 14 September 2009, which we can see as tab 86. I don't think there are any specific points which arise on it, but you say that it gave an update on the changes that had been made to the gifts and hospitality procedure following the comment by the members: "The report notes no changes had been made to the policy, but the guidance documents annexed to the policy had been amended to take on board the members of the CGC's comments." So broadly speaking the CGC's views had been infiltrated into the report, hadn't they?
A. Yes, into the procedures.
Q. Into the procedures. Another report was presented to the CGC setting out the position with regard to the reporting of MPA members and officers of gifts. I don't think similar issues arise here. We have focused for the time being on the MPS, but had there been the same sort of debate and concern over what the MPA itself was doing regarding gifts and hospitality?
A. No. I think members felt that that was in the public domain.
Q. Fair enough. In paragraph 45, you carried out a further audit, which began in August 2011, but that was pursuant to a plan which you'd approved in March 2011, so the reason for the further audit was not the events of July 2011?
A. No, it was already in the approved plan.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
But it's just as well, I suppose, because if it hadn't been in the approved plan, it very quickly would have come into it, wouldn't it?
A. I may well have been asked to do that, sir, yes.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Yes.
MR JAY
You carried out the review and the report is at JN16. We need to see it. It's under tab 90, 13319. Maybe we should look at the executive summary. 13321. 1.4: "We reviewed the effectiveness of the management of the following key risks to achieve the policy intent governing gifts and hospitality." Then there are a series of concerns: "Gifts and hospitality policy does not reflect appropriate professional and ethical standards and/or does not meet legislative requirements. "Ill defined policy for dealing with offers of gifts or hospitality. "Procedures are not aligned to the approved policy and/or are unclear. "Staff and management are not made aware of the policy and procedures or subsequent changes. "Unauthorised acceptance of gifts and/or hospitality, lack of transparency, potential conflicts of interest, non-compliance, inaccurate supervision and review." So there are a whole host of problems here and in paragraph 47 some key risk issues for management action were included, and we can see those in the report itself. Were these problems which had arisen recently, do you think, or put another way, why weren't they addressed in previous reports?
A. I think if I could just put that in context, these aren't problems as such, they are generic risks that you would associate with a gifts and hospitality process, and we're seeking to give assurances as to whether they're operating effectively or not.
Q. One is putting entirely the wrong emphasis to describe it as a problem. It is, as you rightly say in the report, a key risk.
A. Yes.
Q. Just see how this is addressed in the report, though. Section 4, page 13322. Aren't you saying there I may have misunderstood it that these are the failings which your auditing undertaking, as it were, has identified?
A. What we're saying is these are the actual key risks that senior management need to concern them with, yes, and to address.
Q. For example, 4.3, page 13323: "Police officers and members of staff, including Management Board, do not always provide a proper justification as to why hospitality or a gift has been accepted, although this is required under the policy." So presumably to reach that conclusion, you looked at the relevant register and you could see that that failing was demonstrated?
A. Yes.
Q. Is that correct?
A. Mm-hm.
Q. Having done so, it then becomes a risk, does it, under sort of the parlance of auditing?
A. We would say it was a risk that wasn't being managed as effectively as we would want it to be.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
You're not saying that it was inappropriate to accept the hospitality, but if you have a scheme that identifies a mechanism so that risks are minimised and the scheme isn't being operated efficiently or effectively, then it rather defeats the point of the whole exercise?
A. Yes. That recommendation was from a previous audit that we felt needed to be implemented, the justification needs to be clear, and we were following up and giving a review as to whether that had taken place.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
I suppose that in part this has an impact in two ways. It's not merely so that there can be a check. It's also so that the person affected is aware of the need is reminded of the need to justify the decision which he or she takes at the time he's taking the decision, because if you have to go through the process, then you have to go through the intellectual process of deciding: is this sensible?
A. Yes, absolutely.
MR JAY
I've been asked by another core participant to put to you this question, that the issues or the risks which you were identifying in 2011 were issues which were themes throughout the auditing process which started in 2001, the first report is January 2002. Does this not show a lack of will at the top of the MPS both to bring into place proper policies but also to implement them?
A. I think if you look back from back to 2011 and now, what you see is that there is a pattern, that the process itself has been improved, and in fact a couple of the follow-up reviews did show that the recommendations had been implemented and that there had been some improvement, but then with time we do slip back to that improvement not continuing, so it's not been sustainable throughout the period.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Another feature, of course, is that there are different personnel in place who aren't quite as familiar with the rationale or they haven't gone through the same thought processes as to the reasons why the policy has been tightened in the first place.
A. Yes, that is an issue as well.
MR JAY
Following this report, or perhaps as part of it, there was an action plan. 16 actions were agreed with the MPS to improve the governance of dealing with gifts and hospitality and their attendant risks. Six of those 16 actions were assessed to be high risks; is that right?
A. Yes.
Q. So part of the response was a revised gifts and hospitality policy, which was presented to the committee in December. We have that under tab 91, I think, of your bundle, dated 12 December 2011, and the narrative part of it starts at 13343. I think the committee were satisfied with this policy in terms of its substance and its clarity, weren't they?
A. Yes, I think it's true to say they thought it was more explicit than the previous policy.
Q. Thank you. Oh yes, there's one issue which you have noted as a continuing cause for concern, maybe, or at least you feel there's a lack of clarity. This is the sentence in the policy which I actually referred to previously this morning: "The only exception to this is where it can clearly be justified that to refuse would cause serious offence or damage working relations."
A. Yes.
Q. What is the, as it were, problem with that sentence, if any?
A. I think the main issue that we're still seeking further clarification is the circumstances when damaging working relationships in particular would apply to rejecting hospitality.
Q. So you want to be provided, do you, with some concrete examples so you could test the validity of the proposition?
A. I mean that would be one thing for me, but I think more importantly the officers and the staff of the Met need that guidance and they need to be very clear when that criteria actually applies.
Q. Thank you. You then address the Filkin report. There are three key findings which you alight on, and you make the point that you warmly welcome them because they're in line with your own thinking, as it were, thinking underpinning some of the audit reports. Is that a fair summary?
A. Yes. I think they reflect the findings of our recent audit in particular.
Q. Okay. I may be taking that up with a later witness today. The HMIC report. You said at the bottom of page 13113, in your paragraph 56: "From an internal audit perspective, I comment as follows on the areas contained in the overview section." There are perhaps three points you make. Paragraph 57: "I would agree with many of the points made; and our recent review of the MPS control framework demonstrates that whilst there were policies and procedures in place, there was a lack of consistency in their interpretation and application. I also agree there is a need for greater analysis of gifts and hospitality records. I suspect a key issue here is that records are not maintained in sufficient detail or in such a way that records can be readily analysed." So did you detect a trend that basically not enough information was provided, or sometimes information was provided formulaically we saw that in this Inquiry in some of the records such that it couldn't sensibly be analysed?
A. Yes. I mean the difficulty would have been in the past that a lot of that information was actually in individual books stored in various locations across the MPS and having the ability to analyse that would be actually quite difficult.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Yes, you're writing it down for the sake of writing it down without allowing it to be used for any purpose.
A. Mm-hm.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
In that regard, do you have any comment upon the rather surprising discrepancies which are now, I appreciate, explained between the hard copy of the registers and the online versions which were the subject of correspondence between the Chief Executive and the Commissioner only a month ago?
A. Yes. I think possibly a key issue there is that back in September 2011 this was the first time that the Met had actually put their records online, and publicly, and they were doing everything they could to ensure that that record was complete.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Doubtless that's ongoing work.
A. Yes.
MR JAY
We'll go back to your statement, Ms Norgrove. Paragraph 58 is not relevant to this Inquiry, but paragraph 59 may be. When you're dealing with the role of the PCCs, who will come into being in November of this year, you point out that: "They exercise effective oversight, but this must not be seen as a replacement for management control of the system on a day-to-day basis. Strong leadership from the top supported by effective supervision and a clear statement of what is and what is not acceptable are key." So that's an important theme coming out of your evidence, that the important audit function which you're carrying out is in one sense supervisory or ancillary, that what is central to this is strong leadership and the right culture being promoted within the organisation from the top of it?
A. Yes.
Q. Is that
A. Mm-hm.
Q. Okay. If you don't mind, we're going to pass over the next few paragraphs and alight on paragraph 68 at the bottom of page 13116. You're still on the HMIC report here. You: agree with the views expressed within the report that effective governance plays an essential role in demonstrating the highest standards of integrity. It is often the lack of effective supervision and management review that leads to a breakdown in controls and subsequent abuse of systems. I agree that more effective oversight of integrity issues would be productive together with a greater focus on prevention." So is that paragraph 69 borne out of your experience of auditing and you're laying down here a sort of a general rule which applies?
A. Yes.
Q. Then you deal with focus on training issues, which I think are probably self-explanatory, and the importance of that will be readily understood. When you address the principal HMIC recommendations at paragraph 74 and following, I think it's right to say that you endorse all of the key recommendations insofar as they concern module two of this Inquiry, don't you?
A. Yes, I do.
Q. Can I ask you, please, about your conclusions. You do say this is paragraph 78, page 13119 that: the MPS internal control framework for dealing with gifts and hospitality has improved over time." Are we to get the message that recommendations are made by audit, they're then implemented, there's then a bit of a slip, audit comes back in, further recommendations are made and the process is replicated over time? Or is it your evidence, your assessment that there's been a gradual improvement over time?
A. I think there's been certainly an improvement in the recording of hospitality over time, which is still evident. I would say that some of the applications of the key controls around that have been inconsistent over the period.
Q. You specifically identify this issue: the effectiveness of that framework has been adversely affected by the inconsistent application and interpretation of policy and procedures in practice by some in senior positions." Well, I have been asked to ask you this, perhaps the obvious question, you may not want to answer it though: who are you referring to there?
A. I think our recent review did focus in particular on senior officers and that did include management board as well as some borough commanders, and it did show that there was a difference in interpretation of the policy.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
It's not that anybody is deliberately ignoring it, it's that you make a series of recommendations which, whether for lack of understanding or otherwise, are 60 per cent implemented but not entirely implemented. Some people are more enthusiastic than others, so there isn't a consistent approach, and that itself changes over time and needs constantly moving along the road. Is that what you're trying to portray?
A. Yes, it is.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
But you're not suggesting that anybody has deliberately said, "Well, I'm not going to do this"?
A. No, I think there has been and I think our report evidences a difference in interpretation of the policy.
MR JAY
Can I ask you finally, please, to clarify paragraph 80 of your statement. You say: "There is no need for a separate governance process for dealing with hospitality between the police and the media." The reason being that that's covered by the existing process, adequately in your view, presumably?
A. Mm-hm.
Q. "The key is to apply consistently effective controls designed to protect the integrity of individuals and the organisation in dealing with all third parties in this respect." So that's a general principle which you touched on in paragraph 69 and clearly restated here?
A. Yes.
MR JAY
Thank you. Those are all the questions I had for you, Ms Norgrove.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Again, as with the other MOPC witnesses, I'm very grateful to you for what has obviously been a significant piece of work, but I hope that reviewing the history is itself helpful as you plan for the future.
A. It is very helpful, and of course we are also helping HMIC and the Met itself implement some of the issues that may well be arising out of this Inquiry.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Thank you. Is there anything else that you would like to suggest that I ought to be thinking about in any of the areas in respect of which you provide audit or equivalent functions?
A. No, I think they're covered within my statement, thank you.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Thank you very much indeed. Thank you.
A. Thank you.
MR BARR
Sir, the next witness is Mr Priestley.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Thank you. MR BEN WARNER PRIESTLEY (affirmed) Questions by MR BARR
MR BARR
Could you confirm your full name, please?
A. It's Ben Warner Priestley.
Q. You've provided a witness statement to the Inquiry. I understand that there is a correction that needs to be made to the figure at paragraph 4, that you want to change that from 40,000 to 42,000; is that right?
A. Yes, please.
Q. Subject to that correction, are the contents of your witness statement true and correct to the best of your knowledge and belief?
A. They are.
Q. You work for the trade union UNISON, and you tell us in your witness statement that UNISON has 1.2 million members in the health, local government, education, police, justice and utility sectors, but your role is as UNISON's national officer with responsibility for members in the police probation services and CAFCASS; is that right?
A. That is correct.
Q. You've worked for UNISON and its predecessor unions since 1990; is that right?
A. Yes.
Q. Have you personally got any experience of working yourself for the police?
A. No, I've never worked for the Police Service.
Q. Paragraph 2 of your witness statement, you give us an indication and I understand these numbers are approximate of the number of members that you have amongst police staff, and you tell us that it is 42,000 members. Approximately what percentage of the overall number of police staff in the forces that you cover are members of UNISON?
A. On average we would have about 50 per cent of the working population in membership. In each force.
Q. Can you give us some idea obviously it will vary from force to force, but what sort of proportion of the workforce are police staff as opposed to police officers?
A. That's a figure that's changed quite remarkably in the last 10 or 15 years through a process called workforce modernisation or, in other quarters, civilianisation, where the roles previously undertaken by police officers are now very often undertaken by police staff, 999 call takers, forensic officers, investigators, custody and detention officers. About 40 per cent of the police workforce is now police staff rather than police officers. In some forces actually there is a majority of police staff, but they're very, very small in number.
Q. Just to be clear of the distinction, you represent police staff. Police officers, if they want representation, must join their own staff associations a opposed to a trade union?
A. Yes. I think the important distinction is that we represent those individuals who are employed under a contract of employment with the Police Authority, that is until the election of police and crime commissioners, whereas a police officer is sworn into the office of constable and not technically an employee.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
They're members of the federation up to the rank of superintendent?
A. Correct.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
And superintendents have another association that looks after their interests?
A. The Superintendents Association, yes, indeed.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Not perhaps surprisingly called that. Right.
MR BARR
As to the forces whose staff you represent, you tell us that you do not represent police staff who work for the Metropolitan Police Service or for the City of London Police. They are represented, aren't they, if they want trade union representation, by the PCS, Prospect and the FDA?
A. That is right.
Q. Having dealt with those matters, can we now turn to the way in which you have sought to garner the views of your members for the purposes of giving evidence today? You sent out a letter, didn't you, to 49 different police branches and you tell us that in fact the response you got was surprisingly small; is that right?
A. That's correct.
Q. Presumably you from time to time, for varying reasons, send out requests for views from your members. How does the response to this request compare to other requests that you've made?
A. Well, I can confirm that of the 49 responses that were solicited, I received two responses. That is an extremely low response rate. We would normally expect to get at least half of our potential respondents to communicate with us. It seems on this matter that for whatever reason, and I have a few thoughts on that, that our branches did not believe that this was, in terms of UNISON's contribution to the Inquiry, something they were particularly able to help with.
Q. Perhaps you could share those thoughts with us.
A. I followed up the very small number of responses that I received, and the impression I had from talking to colleagues was a perception that the Inquiry was predominantly concerned with matters that related to the Metropolitan Police and that some of the issues and concerns that the Inquiry was examining were not of themselves writ large in provincial forces. That may or may not be correct and I don't make a judgment on that, but certainly that was the outcome of some of the conversations, limited though they were, that I had.
Q. So that's the perception, at least
A. Yes.
Q. of those members who had spoken to you?
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Actually, that itself is an important fact. If true, that itself is important.
A. Yes. Of course I can't verify that is the case.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
No, I understand.
A. But I think that is an important observation, yes.
MR BARR
If we move now to some specific topics, and can I start first of all with ACPO's guidance. You deal with this at paragraph 6 of your witness statement where you tell us that generally speaking UNISON considers ACPO's Communication Advisory Group 2010 guidance relating to media matters to be helpful, but you do identify a lacuna in that it doesn't deal to your satisfaction with inappropriate or unethical contact between the police and the press, and you tell us that you want to see that lacuna dealt with as the HMIC's recommendations arising from "Without fear or favour" are dealt with and actioned. Can I ask you: what role does UNISON expect to play in any consultation exercise arising from the HMIC's report?
A. We would expect, as has been the case with all HMIC consultations certainly since I've been doing this job, that UNISON will be contacted as a stakeholder, as a representative body within the Police Service, and that our views and the views of our members' branches would be sought as part of that. That is our clear expectation.
Q. I'm going to ask you a question; I suspect, given the response you've told us about a moment ago, you may not be able to go too far in answering it, but I'll ask it anyway. Is there anything in particular that UNISON is likely to be pushing for in ensuring that inappropriate or unethical contact between the police and the press is properly covered in any revised guidance?
A. I think the terms of reference and indeed the already published "Without fear or favour" document does indicate that HMIC wants this matter to be dealt with, and whilst we will have some views that I think possibly we'll explore today about where the line might be drawn around inappropriate contact, hospitality, gifts, et cetera, we certainly do expect that to be a key part of the consultation and we will certainly be majoring on that when we provide our views.
Q. I'll move now to the question of off-the-record guidance, which you deal with on page 5 of your statement. You tell us that UNISON doesn't provide any guidance to members about off-the-record conversations with the media. Do you expect the employing police forces to do that?
A. Yes, I think it was our clear view that we would not ordinarily expect to be guiding our members who might work in either a press capacity or indeed an operational capacity in relation to their contact with the press around operational matters. Clearly the union will advise its members or its activists, its branch representatives, on contact with the press in relation to trade union issues, around disputes, et cetera; that would be a quite natural
Q. Quite different?
A. Quite a different set of circumstances. So yes, we would expect the police force in question to be providing that guidance to its staff.
Q. From the conversations that you have had with your branches, what picture has been painted about the amount of off the record contact that your members have with the media?
A. I think the reality is that police staff are less likely to be involved in the sort of contacts with the media that the Inquiry is particularly concerned with, because of their relationship with investigations. My conversations with UNISON members who are police press officers suggest that it would be the senior investigating officer who might be taken for a business lunch by a journalist, because he or she would have the overview of a particular investigation and the journalist would be looking for a particular scoop or a particular angle on that over-arching investigation. Police staff, by nature of their work, tend to work on discrete parts of an investigation. There will be a scenes of crime officer or a fingerprint expert or a crime analyst, and he or she would not have the sort of overview of a particular crime that would enable him or her to give the sort of picture to a journalist that I think is probably looked for.
Q. When it comes to setting professional standards within a police force, are the standards expected common to staff and officers or are they different?
A. There is a common code of professional standards that was previously in place only for police officers. We certainly took the view as a union that in a service that aspires to be a one culture service, where officers and staff are working together as equals within teams, that actually the same standards should quite rightly apply to all in that workforce, and we were instrumental in bringing that code of professional standards into play for police staff working with ACPO, with the Association of Police Authorities, so yes, there is a common code.
Q. Does it follow that looking forward to any future guidance on dealings with the media by police, if I use that word deliberately, you would prefer to see common standards applied to both police officers and police staff in relation to their dealings, even if the ground truth is that your members are rather less likely to deal with the press?
A. Yes, we would take that position.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Is that quite right? Because it may very well be an appropriate part of an SIO's duty to speak to the press. It's quite difficult to see why it would ever be a part of a scenes of crimes officer's duty to speak to the press, therefore why would the rules necessarily be the same?
A. I think one would want to see rules which covered all eventualities, so there would be potentially the on-the-record conversation between the senior investigating officer and/or his police staff equivalent, but there might also be more informal contacts. Police staff press officers, for example, who we do represent, might find themselves in that position, for example.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Yes, I can see why press officers are different, but what I'm really saying is that the rules have to be consistent, but they're not necessarily the same, depending upon the occupation of the person affected.
A. No, I think it would be fair to say that were we engaged in the process of developing those rules, there would be an element of proportionality that might have to apply in the application of X, Y and Z, and that the role and occupation might be taken into account.
MR BARR
Does it come to this: you're saying the moral and ethical standards that should be applied should be uniform, albeit the individual duties of people at different levels and different roles will differ?
A. Yes. I think we start from a presumption that they should be the same, but I think looking in detail at roles would be a part of that investigation and consideration.
Q. You tell us on page 6 of your statement a little about leaks, and I'm interested in picking up on what you say in paragraph 23, where you say: "There are many reasons why leaks are believed to take place, including And the first thing you mention is "lack of confidence in whistle-blowing mechanisms". Can I ask you, from your experience of representing your members, what sort of level of confidence is there in police whistle-blowing policies?
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Well, you have to be a bit careful here because there's an anterior question. Is this general from your experience as a trade union official across a wide range of occupations, that lack of confidence in whistle-blowing mechanisms, which I can understand, or is this intended to be specific to the police, given the response you got and all the limitations that you've put around it?
A. Sure. In terms of my work, the figures that are provided at the beginning of the witness statement in terms of the number of members we represent gives you an indication of what proportion of my work relates to police staff, and it is the majority of the work that I do. So I have a view across policing, probation and CAFCASS, although I've worked in other areas of the union previously. I think in this context, and I'm limiting my comments to policing and an impression that I've gathered over a number of years as to confidence in whistle-blowing, and if I can develop that, I think it's a lack of confidence that relates in policing particularly to the working environment of the Police Service, and you will appreciate that policing is a disciplined service. It is a very hierarchical and authoritarian workplace. Police staff are part of that workforce and much work is being done to integrate them better in that workforce than was perhaps previously the case, but they do on occasion feel themselves to be second class citizens in a service that's predominantly police officer led, and particularly in terms of the management structure, and there is a view amongst our members and our branches that it is very difficult to be seen to rock the boat within a service such as that. I'm not aware in recent years of any public interest disclosures that have taken place, and there is an atmosphere within police forces that I think makes it very difficult for a member of police staff to raise a particular concern, particularly if he or she is ranged against very powerful authority within that particular employer, and I hope that paints you a picture of some of the difficulties that might be faced, particularly in policing when compared to other parts of the public sector, where there may be a slightly more egalitarian feel to the workplace.
MR BARR
I suppose we need to be careful to distinguish between a complaint and blowing the whistle on some wrongful behaviour, and it's very much the latter that I want to concentrate on. What measures would you suggest could be taken to improve the level of confidence of your members in whistle-blowing procedures in police forces?
A. Sure. I would like to think that as an outcome certainly of the HMIC review and potentially also of this Inquiry, that work be done to review the effectiveness of whistle-blowing mechanisms within the Police Service and to examine whether those current procedures have been used, whether they have been essentially left on the shelf. That would be a very useful piece of work and one which I think, were we to arrive at a better system to allow staff the confidence to raise issues, would be a very positive outcome.
Q. If I move now to the question of press officers, paragraph 25 of your witness statement, you, if I've understood the tone of your witness statement correctly, placed a great deal of emphasis and want to convey your opinion that press officers have a very valuable function to play, in particular that the feedback you've received is that they help to solve a great deal of crime. Is that fair?
A. Yes, I think that is fair. I was struck in the albeit limited conversations I had with UNISON members who do work in press for the police that there were numerous occasions that they cited where contact with the press had been beneficial, that it had produced results in terms of witnesses coming forward in relation to crimes or missing persons that would not otherwise have been the case, perhaps in the publication of photographs or indeed names of victims, and that is seen as a very positive relationship. Of course, what I'm describing there are everyday on-the-record contacts between police, press officers and the media.
Q. You deal at the bottom of the page, paragraph 26, with the topic of hospitality, and on the face of your statement you express a very firm view about hospitality. You say: "UNISON takes the view that hospitality and gratuities, in the increasingly commercial environment in which the Government is forcing the Police Service to operate, are not acceptable in any form." You go on to point out: "Commercial interests have a real potential to corrupt the service, and senior leaders in the police should do the right thing and rule out the hospitality gravy train in its entirety." Can we explore that view a little bit? First of all, are you referring to hospitality provided by third parties or hospitality provided by the police or both?
A. I think both.
Q. In terms of what you mean by "hospitality", are you ruling out really absolutely everything, including the offer of a cup of tea, or do you accept that there has to be some threshold somewhere?
A. I've been interested to hear some of the discussion whilst sitting in the Inquiry today, and it certainly does seem to me that if we take a very wide definition of hospitality, attending a conference and eating a dinner at that conference with tens or potentially hundreds of other people was not really what I was referring to in describing hospitality. So I think I accept your point that this may seem overly definitive and would need to be clarified, but I think hospitality in respect of an individual or individuals, excepting perhaps in a private dinner or accepting a private gift, I can see and the union can see no place for those activities within a transparent and open Police Service. I suppose I'm forced to ask the question: how would policing suffer, what part of policing would suffer, if those opportunities were simply ruled out full stop and the agonising of individual officers or staff as to whether they could or couldn't accept a gift or a private dinner or a business lunch were ruled out? It seems to me that the business lunch that the senior investigating officer attends could be replaced by the officer saying to the journalist, "I have a very good office in my police station, would you like to come in and have a cup of tea and we'll talk these things over?" It does seem to me that there has been a very great difficulty on the part of staff and officers potentially in interpreting what it is or isn't acceptable and some very clear lines on that, we feel, should be drawn.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Common courtesy of a cup of tea or a cup of coffee is one thing, but going out for a rather more expansive lunch is something else.
A. Yes, I think we would take that view and we would certainly be making this point in responding to the HMIC or service consultation on this, that it would be better to draw some very tight definitions to help staff and officers in the better performance of their duties.
MR BARR
Would you accept that there may be circumstances in which people working for the police are often offered gifts or hospitality in certain circumstances where to turn it down might cause offence and in those circumstances it might be better to accept the hospitality, obviously declaring it in the register and not necessarily keeping any gift? Do you see that that circumstance might arise?
A. I think the Police Service very often is in a position where it has to provide offence to people, and I think turning down gifts is probably not the most serious of those, and I think, frankly, if it were made very clear that the Police Service is no longer in the business of accepting gifts or gratuities, those people who might wish to offer it would be in a very clear position that it was no longer appropriate.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
I've looked at the register and it might be that a delegation of visiting police officers from another country bring a badge representing their police force or some small token representing their country that has no real monetary value of any sort. You don't include that. You're talking about something rather more tangible?
A. Yes, indeed. If one visits police stations normally those gifts are on prominent display and the sense one has is that they belong to the force, that they are not subject to individual ownership. So yes, I think that is an absolutely correct point.
MR BARR
Finally if I can take you to paragraph 27, where you deal with Elizabeth Filkin's report, obviously accepting straight away that that report is directed towards the Metropolitan Police and not to those services whose staff you represent. You tell us that her recommendation 4 in respect of creating a personal contact log with the press is already in place in many police press offices. Are you able, from the conversations that you've had with your branches, to help us with whether or not in those forces it's been a workable and effective practice?
A. The contact that I've had, which led to this part of our submission, our statement, was with police press officers, and my clear understanding following those discussions was that that was what they worked to, that that was a modus operandi in the press office that everyone adhered to. Clearly that particular procedure does not apply to off-the-record discussions that senior investigating officers, for example, might have. That was my impression.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
But there's no reason why it shouldn't.
A. Absolutely not.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Because "off the record" doesn't mean to say off the police's record.
MR BARR
Thank you, those were all my questions.
A. Thank you.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Thank you very much indeed and thank you for coming.
A. Thank you.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
We'll have a short break. (3.19 pm) (A short break) (3.26 pm)
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Yes, Mr Jay?
MR JAY
The next witnesses we're going to take together, Mr Cunningham and Mr Fegan, please.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Thank you very much. MR IAN NEIL FEGAN (affirmed) MR MIKE CUNNINGHAM (sworn) Questions by MR JAY
MR JAY
Please sit down. I'm going to invite you to give us your full names and attest to the contents of your witness statement. First of all, Mr Cunningham.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes, I'm Michael Cunningham.
Q. Your witness statement is dated 13 February of this year. I'm sure you've signed and dated it, it doesn't matter in particular. Are you content to put this forward as your formal evidence to the Inquiry, Mr Cunningham?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes, I am.
Q. And you, Mr Fegan, your full name please?
MR FEGAN
Ian Neil Fegan.
Q. Thank you. Your statement likewise dated 28 February, is this your formal evidence to the Inquiry?
MR FEGAN
Yes, it is.
Q. I'm going to deal with your careers and current positions first of all. First of all you, Mr Cunningham. You are currently the Chief Constable of Staffordshire Police and have been since September 2009. You joined the Lancashire Constabulary in 1987. You worked your way up the ranks there. Indeed, I think that's the only force you have served in before Staffordshire.
MR CUNNINGHAM
That's correct.
Q. You were Deputy Chief Constable of Lancashire in August 2007 and aside from your responsibilities as Chief Constable you are the ACPO lead in professional standards and you assumed that portfolio last summer?
MR CUNNINGHAM
That's correct.
Q. So that we understand it, we've heard reference to 14 business groups within ACPO. The professional standards portfolio is not a business group in its own right, it is within the workforce development business group?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes, that's correct.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Good time to get that particular brief.
MR CUNNINGHAM
It was, it was.
MR JAY
We'll cover the detail of that in a moment, after I've introduced Mr Fegan. You are a graduate of the University of Wales, postgraduate member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing. You've worked for Staffordshire for 13 years and since January 2010 you are Head of Corporate Communication?
MR FEGAN
That's right.
Q. The number of people you are responsible for, your department, is staffed by 19 full time equivalent posts?
MR FEGAN
That's right.
Q. We're going to deal first of all, Mr Cunningham, with your ACPO responsibilities and then Staffordshire. In terms of ACPO, the second page of your statement, 02372, the remit of the portfolio, there are six components of it. Does it break down into three separate groups, as it were: complaints and misconduct, counter corruption and vetting?
MR CUNNINGHAM
That's correct. In (iii) on page 2, that sets out the three areas which report in to me under the professional standards umbrella.
Q. Thank you. We're not concerned, obviously, with vetting. It's possibly the first two, complaints and misconduct and counter corruption, with the emphasis perhaps most on counter corruption?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes.
Q. ACPO guidance, page 02374, the ACCAG guidance for the investigation of corruption sorry, remind us, please, ACCAG is an acronym for what?
MR CUNNINGHAM
That's the association the ACPO Counter Corruption Advisory Group.
Q. You first published in 2003, last formally revised in 2006?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes.
Q. It identified some common factors as potential corruptors, including former police officers, and you explain why, particularly those in security or private investigation sectors, family members and friends with criminal associations, et cetera. The media was also identified as a source of corruption, with "confidential, sensitive or secret information sought by journalists in return for financial inducements or payments through gifts and hospitality." Financial inducements I think is self-evident, but how significant a risk was this in relation to what you call payments through gifts and hospitality?
MR CUNNINGHAM
That in itself as an issue was not identified as a significant risk. The assessment has identified that the police officers have broadly two commodities with which they would trade, if I could put it that way. One is influence and the other is information. It seems from a chief officer from ACPO perspective that we need to put safeguards in place in order to handle safely the information that we hold and the relationships that officers have and develop, which could become corrupt. And so in terms of assessing the risk, the unauthorised handling of information is a significant risk for the service. And that's been identified in the SOCA strategic assessment of corruption. In order to deal with the handling of information and protecting information, a number of safeguards have been put in place, which I can describe to you if you wish, but contingent upon all of those are relationships which officers subsequently develop. Family and friends was identified as the highest risk in terms of the unlawful disclosure of information. Former colleagues, particularly those in the private security industry, was also a risk. At the point in which the strategic assessment was done in the summer of 2010, journalists were identified as a risk, but not as high a risk as those other groups.
Q. Family and friends would be the highest risk, but that would usually be inadvertent disclosure to family and friends, wouldn't it?
A. It would be inadvertent disclosure on some occasions. On other occasions it would be criminal. So there are examples of, you know, an officer checking out the daughter's new boyfriend through to officers who have criminals who are part of their family and actively seeking intelligence and information from police systems and passing that on.
Q. The police systems you refer to, the main risk may be the Police National Computer, mightn't it?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Actually more likely, Mr Jay, would be force intelligence systems, so force intelligence systems would be accessible by all officers under the normal routine run of their duties, and safeguards need to be put in place as to how officers handle the information that's available to them.
Q. Thank you. You refer on the next page, 02375, to the Schedule to the Police (Conduct) Regulations of 2008 and related Home Office guidance. When you refer in italics there to the relevant standards for police officers and staff, is that within the schedule to the regulations you were referring to?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes, it is.
Q. And so if there is a breach of any of those standards, then by definition there is a disciplinary offence?
MR CUNNINGHAM
The disciplinary offence then would be measured against the standard, in the police conduct regulations, and the guidance that's set out in italics there would assist the person who's making a judgment in relation to that breach in order to form a view as to the severity of that breach.
Q. Most of the guidance is common sense and self-explanatory, but as you say, it sets out a series of touchstones by which a question of breach of the regulations would be assessed?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Exactly.
Q. Presumably or maybe you can assist on this: are the regulations currently under review or is it thought that this guidance is satisfactory as it stands?
MR CUNNINGHAM
The police conduct regulations are under review, but only to the extent that it is likely that later this year they will also encompass unsatisfactory performance as a way of making the consideration around officers. What happens at the moment is that what begins as a professional standards or a discipline investigation may turn into something where the officer is it is I say simply a performance issue, and the conduit between redress for both of those needs to be streamlined. That process is under way. The actual standards themselves, the ten standards set out in the 2008 regulations, will remain.
Q. Thank you. It may be helpful at this stage, since you are in one sense the presiding mind of ACPO behind all of this, to see where or what ACPO is doing in response to the HMIC report and perhaps in anticipation of what this Inquiry is doing.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes.
Q. Because I think we can bring it all together. First of all there's the issue of a statement of mission and values. Could you explain what that is and how you're getting on with that?
MR CUNNINGHAM
The statement of mission and values is complete and has been approved by Chief Constables' Council. I can if it would assist the Inquiry, I could submit a copy of that. Effectively that sets out the core values of the service upon which other guidance can then be framed.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
When was that done?
MR CUNNINGHAM
2011, sir.
MR JAY
I don't think we've seen it as part of this Inquiry. I'm sure I would have remembered it.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
So would I. Yes, please.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes.
MR JAY
So does it occupy the same sort of status as the PSNI's code of ethics we saw yesterday or has it some difference?
MR CUNNINGHAM
It has some difference. The code of ethics in the PSNI is effectively the discipline regulations are the discipline regulations for the Police Service of Northern Ireland in the same way as the 2008 regulations are here. The code of the statement of mission and values has been developed by the service, it's something to which chief constables have signed up, which sets out the principles which would effectively govern the good conduct of officers to which they should aspire, to which officers and staff should aspire in the normal course of their duties. It should allow people, allow staff to help them make good decisions. Effectively that was the purpose of it.
Q. So we're looking at a high level of generality, perhaps principles of integrity, impartiality, honesty, the sort of things you would expect to see and I'm sure they're there, and in a fairly short document?
MR CUNNINGHAM
They are, they're in a very short document. They are stating things such as acting with integrity, compassion and courtesy, using discretion, professional judgment I'm paraphrasing, obviously making every effort to understand the needs of our communities, responding to well-founded criticism with a willingness to learn and to change, committed to deliver a service that we and those we serve can be proud of and which keeps our communities safe.
Q. Is impartiality one of those as well?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Just let me
Q. It may be a general concept
MR CUNNINGHAM
"Showing neither fear nor favour in what we do".
Q. Thank you. Then we look at the specifics of ACPO work. We heard Chief Constable Trotter yesterday speak to work which is being undertaken I think it will be ready fairly soon on police and press relations. That's one piece of work which is being considered by ACPO.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes.
Q. Maybe not within your particular portfolio, but it's of interest to you?
MR CUNNINGHAM
It is. I have the responsibility to lead on ACPO's response to the HMIC inspection report. There are three principal sets of guidance which are being developed. The first one is the one you allude to, which Chief Constable Andy Trotter is leading on, and that would be guidance in relation to police dealing with the press and the media. The two others are the first one is in relation to guidance in relation to the acceptance of gifts and hospitality, and the third is in relation to officers taking secondary employment or having business interests.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
And you're doing gifts and hospitality?
MR CUNNINGHAM
That's correct.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
And who is doing secondary employment?
MR CUNNINGHAM
I am as well, sir. I should also say, Mr Jay, it might assist, that one of the other issues that was raised by HMIC, of course, was the whole issue of corporate governance, and work is being undertaken around recommendations for how corporate governance could be enhanced across the service, and we have engaged with the organisation, the counter corruption organisation Transparency International, who are doing some work for the service in relation to recommendations on corporate governance.
MR JAY
When will all of these be ready, the ACPO work?
MR CUNNINGHAM
The specific three pieces of guidance that I've alluded to will be taken to Chief Constables' Council on 19 April. They will be in draft form at that point, in order to allow us to consult with other chief constables so that we can take that further.
Q. Which of these are provisional or temporary, if I can describe it in those terms, in the sense that they're awaiting further input from this Inquiry, and which of them are going to be standard guidance which lasts the usual three or five years?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Effectively the media guidance is being entitled "interim guidance" at this point, because clearly we are awaiting the outcome of this Inquiry in order to take on board the recommendations that come out of this. It may also be that gifts and hospitality guidance will also be affected by the outcome of this Inquiry. What we are committed to is making sure that the guidelines that we do take on for the service are fully informed by current issues, so anything that comes out of this Inquiry we will be taking into account, and we will always be in a position to alter, change and develop guidance as we go forward.
Q. So the evidence as it emerges from this Inquiry is in one shape or form finding its way into the thinking which is informing the three pieces of work you're doing?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Absolutely.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
I don't want to be chicken and egg. I'm very comfortable with that, but as I said to Mr Trotter yesterday, I am very keen that I get the benefit of the collective experience of extremely senior police officers who know policing very much better than I ever could know it, so your views would be very valuable. And where there is a difference I mean you'll obviously settle upon a policy and that's fine, but if there is any area where there is a difference in views, I would be grateful if ACPO would be prepared not merely to tell me how they have resolved it, but also to explain the difference and the different reasons for those views, because that would help also inform me and the analysis which I provide, which then of course will always come back to you to think about.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Absolutely, sir, and again if it would assist the Inquiry, I'm more than happy to submit any draft guidance that we're preparing to the Inquiry so that you can see the line of thinking that we've adopted to date.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Yes. If you're going back to the council in April, I won't come out with anything before April, and provided it's pretty promptly thereafter, then that's sufficient and then I have your thinking then.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Okay.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
But I will, of course, consider very carefully anything, and any competing views which ACPO care to share with me.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Thank you very much, sir.
MR JAY
Is this also part of the thinking, that ACPO self-evidently is laying down national guidance, you'll expect individual forces throughout the land to apply the principles in the national guidance to their local areas?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes. I think this is going to be the challenge for the service, Mr Jay. We clearly, I think, acknowledge and agree with HMIC that national guidance is required in these areas. We previously haven't had national standards in relation to the three areas I've discussed. What will be a challenge will be to phrase that guidance in such a way as it can be applied to very different circumstances in different places. It needs to be sufficiently high level to be applicable to those different circumstances, yet sufficiently detailed to be meaningful. That's the balance we're trying to strike.
Q. You've given us, if I can properly describe it as such, a sneak preview in relation to one aspect of the gifts and hospitality guidance. At 02380, you say: "I anticipate this response [that's to HMIC] will include more definitive guidance to the Police Service on boundaries of acceptability of gifts and hospitality and will likely commence with the clear presumption that no gift, gratuity or hospitality should ever be sought by any officer at any level within the service. The only hospitality offer that can or should be acceptable extends only to the provision of minimal and ordinary hospitality during the course of any meeting and/or function in line with common courtesy." Et cetera. So that's what we're likely to see in the final version, are we?
MR CUNNINGHAM
It is indeed, yes.
Q. Does this spring from the concerns you identify on page 02381 at the top, the huge damage, you say, to public trust and confidence in relation to the occasions when police dealings with the media have been less than professional, and then you refer to the roots in the events in the summer of last year?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes, I think there are two points I'd like to make in relation to that. ACPO is approaching these issues with real energy and the reason for that is we do recognise that the issues under examination at the moment have potential and have been immensely damaging to public confidence. Immensely damaging to the relationship upon which we build effective policing. Because of that corrosive nature of the issues that we're dealing with, we need to approach this very quickly. We are heartened but absolutely not complacent by the fact that HMIC, IPCC and other people who have scrutinised the police agree that corruption and malpractise is not endemic or systemic. However, the actions of individuals, particularly senior individuals, has been and can be highly damaging. That's why we need to act with the urgency with which we're addressing this.
Q. The work you're doing on secondary employment of business interests, is that going to cover specifically the issue of moving from the Police Service and then working in the media?
MR CUNNINGHAM
No, it's not. It's going to deal with officers who
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Moonlighting? They're doing a job one day and in the evening they're doing something else?
MR CUNNINGHAM
That's right. At the moment there is a variation in what is deemed to be acceptable as secondary employment across the country. HMIC have identified that in their report and we need to look at the decision-making which allows officers and staff to have secondary employment and the guidance for those people making decisions so that we can have some consistency. The watchwords for the ACPO response to HMIC are "consistency" and "transparency". We're trying to have those issues writ large in anything that we do.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Well, what about post-employment positions?
MR CUNNINGHAM
That's an issue that is currently in the early stages of discussion, sir. We are keen to have the debate on post-Police Service employment, but it would be an exaggeration for me to say that active work was under way in relation to it.
MR JAY
This may be something you would move on to after completing the substantial work on the three matters
MR CUNNINGHAM
I can sense it coming, yes.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Told you it was a good brief! Yes.
MR JAY
The issue of leaks, which you cover generically. Understandable: the questions which were asked of you were at a high level of generality. Question 16 and the answer you give at page 02383, when you identify the different possible root causes for leaks. Do all or each of these fall within your own experience as a police officer, obviously looking at what others have done?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes, I think it's fair to say at the moment the most common leak or the most common approach to the press is normally from disgruntled members of staff who have a beef about organisational issues. The service is going through significant change, as I know you're aware, and the changes within the organisation, some staff feel that they need to vent their anger at the organisation through the press. So that's the most common type of leak that we're having at the moment.
Q. The need for balance is something you touch on in your answer to question 17, page 02384. Seven lines from the bottom: "The response of the Police Service will need to consider carefully how best to address this issue without causing any unnecessarily or overly risk averse approach which constrains police and media relationships and is ultimately a disservice to the public." I believe you're someone who favours greater rather than lesser interaction with the media?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes.
Q. Have I correctly understood the position?
MR CUNNINGHAM
That is absolutely my position. I am trying to encourage the staff I have responsibility for to have a professional and open relationship with the press, one in which they are confident when they are put on the spot or questioned by the press or have an issue which they wish to discuss with the press that they have the confidence and the professionalism to know how to do that effectively.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Well, it won't surprise you that you may have heard that that's precisely the view that I have been suggesting to a number of your colleagues over the last few days.
MR CUNNINGHAM
And, sir, I think that one of the reflections I've had on that is that actually staff to some degree are afraid of speaking to the press, and as somebody with leadership responsibilities it seems to me that we have the responsibility to try and give them the equipment to be able to do that properly. I think that's in the public interest and in the interests of the service.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Lack of confidence can be dealt with by training. The more important question is whether they have the balance right as to what it is appropriate to put into the public domain.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes.
MR JAY
I just raise with you we heard from the crime editor of the Times I think last week along the lines that the majority, nearly all of his public interest stories derive from information his term which the police had given him which he knows to be unauthorised in the sense that the Police Service as a whole would rather it didn't enter the public domain, so this is an informal exchange. Police might not like it, but it's in the public interest nonetheless. How, if at all, do you address that issue?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Obviously if information is being passed to the press in an unauthorised manner, that is not a desirable situation. The flipside of that is that I think the service should reflect on how open and transparent we are with issues that sometimes we might consider not to be in the public interest. So I think there is a place for us to think more openly about how we communicate with the public through the press and that's a matter which I think the service should and ought to be taking on and we are taking on as we speak through the guidance that's been developed. For staff to feel that they need to do that in an unauthorised way is regrettable, and at times can be damaging, of course.
Q. The answer to Mr O'Neill is that he'll get his information, but in the right way, through a system which is more open and transparent rather than through the side door or perhaps even the back door, is that fair?
MR CUNNINGHAM
I think that must be the desirable outcome.
Q. Thank you. I move on now, unless there are any specific points Mr Cunningham that you wish to draw out from your written evidence, can I move on now to Staffordshire? It may be we can take this fairly broadly, because we've heard a fair amount of evidence now from the regional forces and their relationships with the regional press. How would you, Mr Cunningham, and then Mr Fegan, characterise the nature of your relationship, first with the regional press and secondly, I suppose, more rarely, with the national press?
MR CUNNINGHAM
It is correct, my dealings with the national press are more rare. The dealings with the regional press, the local press within Staffordshire are quite regular, professional, open. I think the local press have an understanding of Staffordshire Police and know individuals within it, so I think they have an understanding of where we currently are, what our priorities are. I put in place opportunities to speak to press people myself, formal opportunities, which are recorded, which gives them an insight into where we are as an organisation and the policing priorities we have, and as I've just been saying, I'm endeavouring to encourage the staff of Staffordshire Police to have an open and professional relationship with the local press. National press, my dealings with them are very rare, and so in that sense I couldn't characterise those dealings because they're not often enough to have those characteristics.
Q. Right. Mr Fegan, what's your take on this?
MR FEGAN
I think I completely agree with the chief. Our relationships are generally very professional, businesslike, certainly with the local and the regional media. When you look at the amount that we sort of deal with overall, we have a Press Bureau system similar to other forces and I did an analysis on that and that showed what I thought we all knew in the force, that around about 5 per cent, less than 5 per cent of all of our enquiries are from the national media, whereas 39 per cent are from three daily newspapers at Staffordshire, so you can see that our focus, because of our geography and where we are, is really with the local and regional media, with whom we have the closest relationships. Our relationship with the national media is really when we have a specific news event that we're responding to.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
You've not had in Staffordshire one of those inquiries which have blown up in the same way that we've seen in other forces with well, Bird up in Cumbria or Joanna Yeates in Bristol. No experience like that?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Not since I've been chief.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
I'm not encouraging you.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Okay.
MR JAY
Mr Fegan, you say at page 10028, level with the upper hole punch, in the context of the national media: I think it is also fair to assert that the national media is, by its very nature, much less committed to, or socially responsible for, specific geographic communities in our county unlike the local media. This has a significant dynamic upon relationships." That's a polite way of saying perhaps that the relationships are less good, is it?
MR FEGAN
I think they're certainly different, Mr Jay. I think, as I said before, our relationships with the local and regional media are very close, we deal with them on a day-to-day basis. We have, I think, relationships of trust and confidence and mutual understanding. We know each other's sort of objectives. I think it's different with the national media because it is so infrequent, it is when we get particular news events, and as a result of which, I think, that's why our focus has been more on the local and the regional media, and also, you know, like us, they have a big sort of responsibility for the communities they serve. That's where their information comes from, that's where their revenues come from, and certainly we have those joint objectives in terms of serving communities.
Q. I've been asked by one core participant to put to you this point, so I invite your reaction to it: do you think any steps could be taken by the national media, perhaps enforced by a regulator, to improve their relationship with communications departments such as yours?
MR FEGAN
I think that's a very difficult question to answer, Mr Jay. Certainly, as I've said before, our experience is mainly with the local and the regional media, less so than the national media, and perhaps the national media could learn things from their colleagues in the regional/local media.
Q. In terms of how your force deals with the press, the first instance or the normal course is that the entry point will be through your office, Mr Fegan, and then, if necessary, you'll put the journalist in touch with the relevant police officer, unless there is pre-existing contact between the journalist and the police officer; is that broadly speaking right?
MR FEGAN
That's correct, yes.
Q. I've been asked to put this to you, again by a core participant: as a matter of policy, would you find it preferable for all traditional media requests to come through your office rather than there being any direct contact?
MR FEGAN
No, not really. Again, I think the evidence shows this, we have pre-existing relationships at local policing team level within Staffordshire where local policing team commanders have meetings with the local media and certainly, you know, we encourage the local officers to be open and transparent and to build those relationships with the local media, so that is something that we'd want to continue, I think. What we have, and it's set out in our guidance, is that if the Inquiry is at corporate or policy level, then we would expect that, quite rightly, I think, to come through the central press office.
MR CUNNINGHAM
If I may add there, Mr Jay, I would be very disappointed if we arrived at a position where all enquiries from the press had to be funnelled through our press office. I'm seeking a much more organic relationship with the press, which allows officers who are closest to the issues to be able to speak to the press about what those issues are and what we're doing about them. It's part of our accountability.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
But what do you say about not a report back, but a note back that there had been such contact?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes, I think that's absolutely right and appropriate. I think again proportionate. A local officer speaking to a local journalist about a very local issue, a simple record of the fact that that took place in the officer's notebook would absolutely suffice. If it was something more significant, then clearly that record would have to be more complete.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
What do you think about the suggestion that that would chill the relationship, because police officers wouldn't speak to journalists?
MR CUNNINGHAM
I don't accept that that would be the case. Provided it were done in a way which officers recognised we're not what we're not asking for. What we don't want to happen here is the pendulum swing that one of your previous witnesses has spoken about. This is about a measured professional response to another professional agency through the press and how we deal with that ought to be a matter of record. I don't see any difficulty with that.
MR FEGAN
Can I add, sir, we actually record centrally that contact anyway, so this is really just an extension of that.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Thank you.
MR JAY
On the issue of hospitality, Mr Cunningham, you've spoken about this already through your ACPO role, wearing your ACPO hat, so it's unsurprising we see similar philosophy running through the way you don't accept hospitality as Chief Constable of the Stafford Police. You tell us at 02397 there's really very little of interest. There's one lunch of approximately ?20, you tell us, meeting the editor of the Staffordshire Newsletter on 16 April 2010 at a hotel in Stafford: that's it?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes, that's it. That was some months after I'd arrived and the editor was having lunch with a regional manager from the newspaper group and invited me down to meet the regional manager for a getting to know me kind of event, and I accepted.
Q. Your force policy on gifts, gratuities and hospitality, tab 17, page 02401. It's a good and clear policy, but I'm not going to refer to it, we've read it. It's under our tab 17. It's certainly in line with the best regional policies we've seen over the last few weeks. Can I ask you, Mr Cunningham, about the Bad Apple system. I don't think we've had reference to this before. It's question 58, page 02406.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes.
Q. It's quite a recent piece of software. What does it do?
MR CUNNINGHAM
This isn't the software. We've a couple of pieces of software that we use. One is in relation to the auditing of systems, and that is a piece of software that will audit every key stroke that officers make on computers. That allows us, around the protection of information, to provide a very complete audit system. The Bad Apple system is a facility which allows officers to report electronically through our intranet system any wrongdoing on the part of colleagues anonymously. It's a system which allows officers to report it without any trace back to their own email account, as it were, so the officers can be confident that they're passing that information anonymously.
Q. If the information is received, then whoever is auditing or running the system will pick it up and do the appropriate, is that the idea?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Correct. It's an electronic whistle-blowing system as opposed to the confidential telephone system.
Q. Is this being run out through police forces up and down the country, as far as you're aware?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes, a number of forces are picking this up. We certainly weren't the first.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Far be it from me to ask a question which might have a very simple answer, but it just struck me that there could be a mismatch between these two systems. It's obvious that you will want through your Bad Apple system confidentially to get information.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
You're way ahead of me.
MR CUNNINGHAM
I can see I know exactly the point you're making. The audit system is used in investigation purposes, and what we try and do is give staff the confidence to report through the Bad Apple system, recognising that we will not be tracing that back through audits, but I do recognise the point you're making, sir.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Thank you.
MR JAY
I think the last point, Mr Cunningham, Mr Fegan may have a view about this as well, the use of social media. Your statement makes it clear, Mr Cunningham, this is of increasing prevalence, Twitter and Facebook accounts. As a matter of principle, I think you believe it's probably a good thing, but are there any problems with it?
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes. Social networking provides the service with some fantastic opportunities to communicate directly, swiftly, give accurate information to the public on a 24-7 basis that we've never had before. It also provides us with a reach that we have never previously had, and so the opportunities are huge. There are risks. There are risks around on and off duty conduct, officers misbehaving, of officers putting inappropriate comments on the system. There's risks also that were identified through the Serious Organised Crime Agency strategic assessment of officers identifying themselves as police officers and then maybe being the subject of corruptors trying to befriend them and the like. So those risks are out there, but what we should do is my firm belief is that we should mitigate those risks rather than stand in front of the Canute like in front of the waves of social networking. It's there, it's with us, and we need to manage it effectively.
MR JAY
Thank you. A nice image with which to end your evidence, Mr Cunningham. Do you have a view on this, Mr Fegan?
MR FEGAN
Yes, I think it's a fantastic opportunity for the service, it makes us more open and transparent. Within Staffordshire we now have 55,000 people following us on social media sites, and of course this is improving direct engagement with communities. The media follow us. So it makes us more responsive as a service as well as being open and transparent.
MR JAY
Those are all the questions I had for you. Is there anything you wish to add, either of you, to your evidence? Obviously the rest of your statements will be taken as read.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Just to repeat the point for me, Mr Jay, if I may, that ACPO is responding confidently and openly to the HMIC "Without fear or favour" recommendations and to what was contained within the Filkin report, and we will do likewise as this Inquiry concludes as well. We want to make sure that we take the recommendations of people who are scrutinising our activities very seriously and building them in to the guidance that we're developing so that that guidance actually gets grease to the squeak, as it were, and we're able to respond effectively and quickly.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
I'm very grateful for that, but I repeat, because it's very important, not just for the police but in relation to all other persons or bodies affected by this Inquiry, that they shouldn't feel it necessary to wait for me. The very fact of the public discussion of these issues has struck me over the months as itself being an extremely important vehicle whereby those who are charged with making decisions can get a sense of what is happening and the perception of what is happening in a way that doesn't require me then to write it all down, although I will, but is itself a very great deal of the positive impact, at least I hope it's a positive impact, of the fact of this Inquiry.
MR CUNNINGHAM
Yes. Thank you.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
Thank you very much indeed. Thank you both very much for coming. 10 o'clock on Monday. It is next Wednesday, is it, Mr Jay, that we are starting early?
MR JAY
It is, indeed. 9.15.
LORD JUSTICE LEVESON
I give notice that on Wednesday next we shall start at 9.15, because a witness will be giving evidence on a video-link and that's the time that we have to do it. Thank you very much indeed. (4.15 pm)
