My right honourable friend the Minister of State for Security, Counter-Terrorism, Crime and Policing (Tony McNulty) has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.
I am today announcing that three more initiatives are being added to the 10 already included as demonstrator sites for the protective capabilities programme. These initiatives are addressing the demands of major crime, serious organised crime and other threats to public safety by police forces and authorities working together on a range of different collaborative projects.
The new initiatives that the Home Office will be supporting are:
Police Forces and Authorities Initiative Staffordshire/Warwickshire/West Mercia/West Midlands Regional intelligence project: to develop enhanced intelligence structures between the four regional forces Derbyshire/Leicestershire/Lincolnshire/Northamptonshire/Nottinghamshire Specialist operational capacity and capability: to identify and take forward opportunities to deliver joint specialist requirements for protective services across the region. Humberside/North Yorkshire/South Yorkshire/West Yorkshire Fast-time tasking, co-ordinating and resourcing arrangements: to provide capacity and capability coverage for all seven protective services across the forces of the region
The selection of these three initiatives, from 12 proposals submitted, will bring the number of forces participating in the programme to 34 across England and Wales.
The demonstrator sites are being established to examine and develop different models of collaboration between forces to enhance the delivery of a range of policing services focused on protecting the public. The lessons learnt will be used to strengthen the development of future police joint working, particularly in finding ways to improve the capability and capacity for protective services delivery.
Home Office funding of £4.1 million is being provided in total to the demonstrators to support the start-up costs of their projects.