Foreword

Serious and organised crime (SOC) has a devastating effect on our country, threatening individuals, national security and prosperity. The impact of organised criminal networks is visible on our streets and in our communities. We have made safer streets one of the central missions for this government with commitments to halve violence against women and girls, halve knife crime, and restore confidence in the policing and justice system.

At the local level, law enforcement cannot tackle SOC and related crime alone. Effective action requires involvement from all statutory and non-statutory partners who need to work together as effectively and efficiently as possible to reduce SOC.

Local multi-agency partnerships must ensure they understand the areas within their geographical jurisdiction which are impacted by SOC and that a whole-system response is undertaken to tackle it. This starts with a comprehensive ‘profile’ of SOC which enables identification of opportunities for targeted action that reduces the threat and vulnerability. This must include protecting the public from harm in the first place; relentless disruption of the organised criminal groups (OCGs), their business models, criminal networks and enablers; and working proactively with the communities impacted to build long term resistance and resilience to SOC which will prevent its recurrence in future.

The original guidance on SOC local profiles was introduced in 2014. Since then, the SOC landscape has changed considerably as has the governance around partnership working at a local level. Through working with key national sector stakeholders including the National Police Chiefs Council, His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire Rescue Services, Local Government Association, and Welsh Local Government Association, we have identified these profiles as an area that needs to be significantly improved.

Therefore, I am introducing new guidance which clearly sets out why local profiles are important as well as the guiding principles for their implementation including how they should be used by partnerships to develop comprehensive 4P (prepare, pursue, protect, and prevent) plans so the activity being undertaken to reduce SOC is having a positive impact on our communities. This has been developed in consultation with police and local partners to ensure the principles meet their specific needs and can drive forward improvements to local delivery and innovative practice.

I hope that all those working at the local level to tackle SOC will find this guidance helpful in developing a comprehensive understanding of the SOC threat within their area and enable them to take the most robust and relentless response to reducing SOC and the impact of OCGs in a sustainable way.  

February 2025

Minister of State (Minister for Security)

Dan Jarvis MBE MP

1. Approach to the guidance

1.1 This guidance has been written for, and in consultation with, the police and local partners who should use local profiles to inform their priorities. It sets out guiding principles, best practice and a clear link to 4P plans to support the start of effective activity to tackle SOC in the highest-harm areas in England and Wales. Criminal justice is reserved to the United Kingdom Government, but services such as local authorities (LAs), housing, schools, and youth services, are devolved to Wales.

1.2 The SOC landscape in England and Wales has altered since the last guidance was published in 2014; technology has developed, and the Covid 19 pandemic changed how we live, and impacted the economy and how SOC manifests itself in local communities.

1.3 To support the development of this guidance, over the course of the last year, the Home Office and National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) have undertaken a consultation across forces and other local practitioners to understand how SOC partnerships could be strengthened. It was clear that a key priority should be to make improvements to how SOC local profiles were being coordinated and used by partnerships.

1.4 This was echoed by the most recent HMICFRS findings – which showed while there was innovative practice, there were a lot of areas for improvement in some forces. For example, Local profiles were out of date and in some areas not completed at all. Where they were completed, some were not used effectively to drive forward activity to reduce SOC and then measure the impact this activity had. There was also confusion around how regularly the profiles should be updated, significant barriers to information sharing and how the information should be used within a governance setting for both strategic and tactical decision making. 

1.5 This guidance has been designed with and for local practitioners to overcome these issues and encourage good profiling of areas which is the fundamental first step in understanding and tackling SOC effectively.

2. Guiding principles

What is a SOC local profile?

2.1 Multi-agency partnerships should own and oversee the SOC local profile. Content development should be coordinated by police forces in liaison with local partner agencies who will proactively share a range of partnership data to help enrich the picture of threat as far as possible. Profiles should provide the need-to-know details of the entirety of the local threat from SOC in a concise and digestible format. This includes the harm and threat emanating from SOC, as well as the vulnerabilities that could cause SOC to emerge and take hold in communities. Local profiles should be live documents that respond to changes in threat picture and identify intelligence gaps and recommendations. Partner agencies as well as the police should be tasked to fill these gaps and take forward the recommendations they are best placed to lead. Effective local profiles will drive a proactive multi-agency response to SOC threat.

What is a 4P delivery plan?

2.2 4P delivery plans should be used to identify and prioritise the appropriate action among multi-agency partners involved in reducing SOC: from preventing crime in the first place, to pursuing OCGs, and helping victims and communities recover from the impact.

The four different strands are:

• Prepare: reducing the impact of SOC by understanding the threat and working with communities to reduce it.
• Pursue: protecting and disrupting SOC.
• Prevent: preventing people from engaging in SOC in the first place.
• Protect: increasing protection against SOC.

2.3 What are the guiding principles for SOC local profiles?

The Seven guiding principles for SOC local profiles are:

The following guiding principles are designed to address the key challenges identified. SOC local profiles should be:

1.Concise, strategic document that supports tactical, location based planning in the highest harm areas where SOC manifests. The local profile should not be a lengthy narrative document, but a succinct, practical format which is easy to update and share. It should function as a practitioner’s need-to-know guide for use by community partners and frontline officers alike.

2. Used to inform and drive tactical 4P plans linked to the highest-harm areas / communities identified and highlight opportunities for prevention. The 4P plans set out the activity needed to reduce the entirety of the SOC threat through coordinated multi-agency activity.

3.Based on and informed by a wide range of local partnership data specific to the area. This should not be limited to police data. Organised crime groups and their enablers, MoRILE (Management of risk in law enforcement) scoring, neighbourhood crime, anti-social behaviour, serious violence, priority locations and / or individuals are all crucial data components. However, it is important to draw in a more contextual understanding of the harms and vulnerabilities impacting a local area through data from health and education partners and local authorities, as well as socio-economic indicators like population demographics, deprivation, and levels of employment. The extent of the data included will be for local areas to determine based on need and availability. Pre-existing profiles such as drugs market profiles and serious violence strategic needs assessments can also inform the SOC local profile and may serve as a more efficient means to harness additional sources of data.

4.Compiled and shared at an appropriate classification. ‘Official’ level is recommended, unless there are exceptional circumstances, in order to allow for timely progress when executing action from the local profiles and 4P plans. The appropriate classification will allow for it to inform other strategic documents, including drugs and homicide profiles, and force management statements, and align to other strategic priorities such as those contained within the strategic policing requirement set by the Home Secretary.

5.Underpinned by governance to ensure robust decision making, clear roles and responsibilities, and the right level of accountability for contributions, data sharing, and 4P activity. Decisions for which agency leads and manages the updates of the local profiles should be decided through the governance model. Local profiles should be based on, and informed by, a wide range of local partnership data specific to the area. This should include, but is not limited to, data from a range of sectors including police, health, education partners and local authorities. Governance models, such as community safety partnership or SOC partnership boards, will vary across areas and forces. As such, each agency’s responsibilities for information sharing and processing should remain in place, this guidance is not intended to affect those responsibilities. Teams may wish to use information sharing agreements (ISA) to ensure connectivity with their key partners. Teams may also wish to turn to the Information Commissioner’s Office Data Sharing Code of Practice for further guidance. ^{[footnote 1]}

6.Subject to regular review so that they remain accurate and agile in the face of a changing threat picture. A more substantive refresh is recommended every 12 months This will enable the partnership to determine the impact of the activity in reducing the entirety of threat from SOC and allow for the identification of any emerging issues.

7. Dynamic and innovative. Forces and partners should use the tools at their disposal to build as comprehensive a picture of SOC as possible. This may include inclusion of infographics, heat maps, or other data visualisation tools to highlight pertinent information in a clear, easy to digest format.

2.4 Combining with a 4P plan – what do activities under the 4Ps look like?

Prepare: Preparing local partnerships to tackle serious and organised crime

• Define local areas that require a combined / collaborative effort to tackle SOC.
• Ensure priority areas have local profiles and 4P plans.
• Situational crime prevention.
• ‘Designing out’ crime initiatives for public spaces.
• Horizon scanning for future locations vulnerable or susceptible to SOC.
• Promote understanding of serious and organised crime across partnerships and communities supported by ISA.
• Identify and actualise opportunities to work with businesses and the voluntary and charity sector to maximise community resilience towards serious and organised crime.
• Capture learning and best practice to make continuous improvements to partnership working.
• Embedding effective governance and partnerships with the right roles and responsibilities.
• Use community engagement strategies to encourage the collection of local intelligence, identify hard to reach communities.
• Employ learning and development strategies to raise awareness with personnel (police and partners), to understand how SOC manifests in local communities.

Prevent: Local partnership approaches built to prevent people from (re) engaging in organised crime

• Work with public and private sectors to effectively deliver prevent initiatives and diversionary schemes.
• Deterring young people (taking an early intervention approach) from engaging or being drawn into SOC.
• Using SOC local profiles / similar to identify individuals and areas that are vulnerable.
• Consider use of civil and ancillary orders.
• Effective links throughout the criminal justice system to prevent those already within the system continuing to offend. Identifying early intervention opportunities.
• Looking for media / communication methods to reassure communities of partnership activity and raise awareness of SOC.
• Working across partners to identify opportunities to address the causes of OCG members and early intervention.
• Consider the rehabilitative possibilities available to support offenders exit criminality in a sustainable way e.g. post-release from prison - and the potential to marry this with harder edged lifetime offender management tactics.
• Ensuring a strong evidence base is used when interventions and diversionary techniques are implemented.
• Seek to understand what is required to effectively prevent SOC, including reviewing and developing the prevent offer with other agencies.
• Develop a tool to assess those at risk, so that the prevent approach can be managed according to risk.
• Utilise techniques to analyse criminal networks and identify those who may be on the cusp of SOC.
• Seek feedback from services and service users that have delivered or accessed prevent programmes to identify where services can improve.
• Where suitable, engage with academia or private sector to undertake independent formal evaluation of preventative programmes.

Protect: Work with partners to protect communities from the harm caused by SOC

• Protecting the vulnerable, including children, young people, and the elderly from exploitation.
• Work with businesses to build their resilience against SOC.
• Ensure neighbourhood policing have a visible presence in communities to engage with residents.
• Develop working relationships with community leaders to support diverse needs of at-risk areas using bespoke, targeted and appropriate communication methods.
• Ensure sufficient understanding of the effective and efficient implementation of safeguarding requirements and support are in place [these policies and legal frameworks are different in England and Wales].
• Analyse criminal networks and identify those who may be victims of SOC or are being exploited.
• Use relevant partnership powers, ancillary, and civil orders to protect the vulnerable, such as using closure notices to restrict access to residential and commercial property.
• Engage services that provide support to at risk groups such as children’s homes, so they know how to spot the signs of exploitation and how to refer concerns.
• Issue threat to life notices.
• Use the National Referral Mechanism to protect victims of modern slavery human trafficking / exploitation.
• Work with housing colleagues to protect and safeguard victims in their own homes, or in extreme circumstances, find alternative suitable accommodation.
• Work with licensing so that relevant sectors know how to identify and flag concerns e.g. taxi services.
• Work to gain access to commercial premises, for example, fire safety checks done by FRS.
• Undertake multi-agency visits to identify public health concerns with e.g. HSE, FSA, trading standards.
• Engage small businesses who are at risk of operating illegitimately, e.g. eBay sellers at risk of trading counterfeit goods.

Pursue: Pursue work is the disruptive action undertaken by police and partners to reduce the threat from SOC

• Use overt and covert tactics (such as those available through the ROCU) to disrupt and dismantle the activities of OCGs and criminal networks.
• Use the full menu of partner agency powers such as those held by the local authority, Environment Agency, GLAA, DWP and HMRC to disrupt OCG business models.
• Work with prisons and probation to ensure the effective management of lifetime offenders.
• Undertake financial investigations to identify criminal assets for freezing, seizing or confiscation.

3. Implementation

Frequently asked questions

What does a ‘good’ approach to SOC local profiles and 4P plans look like?

3.1 To ensure an effective, whole-system approach to SOC at the local level, multi-agency partnerships should focus on the entire SOC threat within an area and decide collectively on the activity needed to reduce it.

3.2 The partnership should include but not be limited to the police, education, health and social care, immigration enforcement, prisons and probation, and where appropriate, the voluntary charity, private sector, and trade unions. These services are devolved in Wales.

3.3 Local profiles should be created and shared within the multi-agency partnership. This should be an evidence-based document which is used to manage threat and vulnerabilities in a way which informs local multi-agency partnerships to comprehensively understand and take action to tackle SOC. The overall aim and objective should be to keep communities safe from SOC, OCGs and make them more resilient to the threat in the future.

3.4 A good local profile process should provide a framework that supports and enables lawful, necessary, proportionate, secure and accountable information sharing. As structures, processes and relationships develop, Local profiles should start to become a shared assessment of risk that informs local partnerships’ strategic and tactical approaches to reducing the level of SOC.

3.5 Local profiles provide the opportunity to ensure all available information, assets and powers, for example, the new serious violence duty, and the Crime and Disorder Act, are brought together in a streamlined way to tackle SOC comprehensively in local communities. Partnerships should share and exchange information to support this where appropriate and within legislative constraints to develop the profile, possibly through an ISA or board terms of reference.

3.6 This information collated in the local profile should allow for comprehensive 4P action plans, with strong governance and clear lines of accountability and ownership across the partner agencies. The profile and plan should also strengthen multi-agency learning and understanding of SOC and drive reductions in SOC and harm in communities.

3.7 Local profiles and 4P plans should be accessible and user friendly. Both ought to exist in a format that is easy to read, update, share, and manage. Teams may wish to make use of maps, diagrams, and explore innovative approaches to showcase information, such as through data visualisation software or technology to allow teams to quickly glean and use pertinent information.

Who should own SOC local profiles and 4P plans?

3.8 Police forces should coordinate the development of SOC local profiles with the proactive contribution of data and analysis from partner agencies to ensure the richest possible picture of threat and harm. Local profiles will be owned and overseen by the most appropriate multi-agency partnership which will be responsible for reviewing the profile and holding partner agencies as well as police to account for developing content and actioning intelligence gaps. 4P delivery plans should also be coordinated by the relevant partnership and the actions within them allocated to the agencies best placed to lead. This will not always be the police, particularly in the ‘Prevent, Protect and Prepare’ space.

The relevant governance should encourage:

1. Clear ownership of raised issues by the most appropriate lead agency (e.g. to fill an intelligence gap identified with a local profile; to deploy a particular power or tactic required within a 4P Plan).

2. Use of a wide range of information and data sets that can help enhance the content – looking to fill any gaps where required.

3. Identifying where specific powers such as the serious violence duty can be applied.

4. 4P actions and measuring the impact of activity against the threat.

What geographic boundaries should SOC local profiles cover?

3.9 Local profiles will be more effective in driving operational activity within 4P plans if they cover smaller geographical areas, such as a district for example. It is recommended that forces work with their partner agencies to develop profiles for all districts, rather than just those where there is already a known threat. The signs, symptoms and vulnerabilities associated with SOC can lie hidden from view and forces and local partners should be proactive in understanding every corner of their force or local authority area where SOC could be manifesting. This will ensure the totality of SOC can be responded to as part of a whole-system 4P response.

What is the specific role of local authorities when using local profiles?

3.10 Local authorities are key to tackling SOC locally; they hold significant statutory powers that can disrupt organised crime groups, including rights of entry, and are central to facilitating multi-agency partnership working. Local authorities have access to information and data to inform local profiles regarding how SOC threats emanate in the local area. This may include housing, environmental health, trading standards, licensing departments, children’s services, youth offending services and community safety.

What other policing capabilities should the local profile be shared with?

3.11  Regional organised crime units (ROCUs) have a critical role in leading and coordinating the response to complex, cross-border SOC threats, which includes supporting local police forces gather and share relevant intelligence. As such they can provide useful information and intelligence context to local profile development at local level. It is therefore recommended that forces continue to share their local profiles with regional organised crime threat assessments teams (ROCTA). This in turn will help to enhance the regional SOC threat picture.

An effective, joined-up SOC response relies on neighbourhood policing and other frontline capabilities having a good understanding of SOC and how it impacts their communities. Forces are therefore encouraged to share local profiles with neighbourhood policing teams as this will assist those officers in:

1. understanding the wider threat context in which they are operating

2. identifying and reporting the signs, symptoms and vulnerabilities associated with SOC in their communities, to feed the cycle of intelligence and threat picture development

3. developing comprehensive 4P responses at community level

Do local profiles apply in Wales?

3.12 Devolved and non-devolved organisations work in partnership in Wales to deliver the best possible outcomes for people and to reflect relevant Welsh Government legislation and strategies in the delivery of services. Organisations such as the Welsh Government, Public Health Wales, local authorities, local health boards, substance misuse area planning boards, His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service in Wales, policing in Wales, the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice work closely together in Wales to deliver effective services and support a distinct approach to the delivery of the crime and justice provision in Wales.

In describing a whole-system partnership approach, we recognise that while crime and policing in England and Wales is the responsibility of the UK Government, in Wales the key services which help to prevent crime such as health, local authorities, social care and education are devolved to the Senned (Welsh Parliament). Every Welsh local area has a range of existing multi-agency arrangements in place where local profiles may be useful tools. These include public service boards (under the Wellbeing of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015), regional partnership boards (Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014), Regional safeguarding boards for both adults and children (Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014), Regional or local community safety partnerships, regional violence against women, domestic abuse and sexual violence (VAWDASV) boards (VAWDASV (Wales) Act 2015).

4. Innovative practice and case studies

The case studies below demonstrate some examples of innovative practice related to local profile development.

West Yorkshire’s innovative practice includes the use of a crime severity index to rank the highest-scoring wards to focus efforts to combat SOC in the areas of highest harm. The force then revisits the crime severity index score every six months to review what impact its activity is having within the community.

Northumbria’s innovative practice relates to the use of a data tool to analyse crime hotspots to make more efficient use of police and partnership resources.

Footnotes