PROTECT

MINUTES

NATIONAL POLICE AIR SERVICE (NPAS)

NATIONAL STRATEGIC BOARD– BUDGET SETTING MEETING

18 January 2017

PRESENT

NAME / REPRESENTING
PCC Mark Burns-Williamson OBE (MBW) Chair / Police and Crime Commissioner for West Yorkshire police – Lead Local Policing Body
CC Dee Collins QPM (DC) / West Yorkshire Police – Lead Local Chief Constable
Ch.Supt Tyron Joyce (TJ) / NPAS Chief Operating Officer
Ollie Dismore (OD) / NPAS Director of Operations
Janine Nelson (JN) / Solicitor, Legal Services, West Yorkshire Police
Katherine Johnson (KJ) / Treasurer – West Yorkshire Office of Police and Crime Commissioner
Mark Reeves (MRe) / Temporary Director of Finance & Business Support - West Yorkshire Police
PCC Barry Coppinger (BC) / Police and Crime Commissioner for Cleveland - North East Region
CC Dave Jones (DJ) (by phone) / North Yorkshire Police – North East Region
PCC Peter McCall (PM) (by phone) / Police and Crime Commissioner for Cumbria – North West Region
CC Jerry Graham (JG) / Cumbria Police – North West Region
PCC Stephen Mold (SM) / Police and Crime Commissioner for Northamptonshire – Central Region
Ruth Hodson (RH) on behalf of Cmdr. Matt Twist / Metropolitan Police Service – London Region
Alex Anderson (AA)
(representing Rebecca Lawrence) / MOPAC – Mayors Office for Police and Crime
ACC Darren Davies (DD) / MPS – Director CT Change, National Counter Terrorism
PCC Anthony Stansfeld (AS) (by phone) / Police and Crime Commissioner for Thames Valley - South East Region
PCC Dafydd Llywelyn (DL) (by phone) / Police and Crime Commissioner for Dyfed-Powys – South West Region
Supt Ian Roberts (representing CC Suzette Davenport - by phone) / Gloucestershire Police - South West Region
Jenny Walker (JN) / NPAS Marketing & Communications Manager
Glenn Shelley (GS) / NPAS Head of Business Services
Melanie Jaundziekars (MJ) / NPAS Support Officer

APOLOGIES

NAME / REPRESENTING
Fraser Sampson (FS) / Chief Executive & Solicitor – Office of Police and Crime Commissioner for West Yorkshire
CC Simon Byrne QPM (SB) / National Police Chief’s Council (NPCC) Aviation Lead – North West Region
CC Neil Rhodes / Leicestershire Police – Central Region

The Chair, PCC Mark Burns-Williamson (MBW) opened the meeting and invited introductions from those in the room and dialling in on the conference call facility. MBW reminded Board members that the decision to be taken on the budget under the terms of reference of the Board is made by the Police and Crime Commissionersonly.

  1. APOLOGIES

Noted and recorded.

  1. DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

No interests were declared.

  1. BUDGET AND PROPOSED CONTRIBUTIONS 2017/18

Mark Reeves (MR) stated the budget for 2017/18 had been calculated at £38.724 million. Board members were obliged to set a balanced budget and consider contributions that PCC/forces will make to NPAS for the next financial year using the actioned calls to service, the model that had been agreed at the Board meeting in July 2015.

Budget

MR advised that NPAS had achieved the target of a 14% saving over the two years and delivered early savings. It was proposed that as part of the budget setting process Board Members approve the establishment of a reserve of £1m from the early savings achieved in 2015/16 to mitigate against price rises and exchange rate fluctuations and that any use of the reserve is reported back to the Board.

Dafydd Llywelyn (DL) asked whether the figure of £1m was sufficientfrom a financial perspective and MR confirmed he was content with that level of reserve.

The PCC’s approved the revenue budget for 2017/18.

The PCC’s approved the establishment of a reserve of £1m to mitigate against price rises and exchange rate fluctuations and for the Board to receive regular updates on the use of the reserve.

Proposed Contributions

MR summarised the appendices as follows:-

Appendix B – summary of the actioned calls to service for January to December 2016. Comparative figures for Humberside were not available as they joined the collaboration in September 2016. The data for Humberside between September and December had been extrapolated to estimate their annual actioned calls with some seasonal adjustments.

Appendix C – shows the charges for 2017/18 financial year based solely on the actioned calls from January to December 2016. There are no adjustments to the figures and the charges reflect the contribution from each force using actioned calls as the measure with no mechanism of dampening or transitional arrangements.

Appendix D – shows the charges for 2017/18 financial year compared against the 2015/16 baseline and shows that for forces that have an increase they pay 50% of the increase and for forces that have received a lower charge they receive 83% of the lower charge.

Appendix E – summaries previous two appendices set against 2016/17 contributions that were agreed in January 2016.

PCC Anthony Stansfeld (AS) queried the amount that Avon & Somerset would be paying. DL stated he represented the South West and had received no communication from Avon & Somerset in relation to their charges. DL stated that he had not been a Board member when the original transitional agreements had been agreed and statedthat some form of dampening might be worth considering.

Alex Anderson (AA)stated the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) had significant internal city functions which other areas do not have and do not receive full funding from the government. AAraised concern around the change of volumes going forward and what the impact would be if callout volumes reduced and felt that a cap would limit charges. TJ reminded members that there had been 62 iterations of the funding model and the model had been chosen unanimously.

Ruth Hodson (RH) stated she had not seen any figures which reflected the MPS had reduced their rental charge for Lippitts Hill resulting in a £200k shortfall and stated there hadn’t been a 3% reduction each year. MBW advised that 3% was never something that was accepted by the Board because it was always subject to whatever the funding formula mechanism that was approved by the Board. KJ statedthat Camilla Black (Snr officer, MOPAC) had been on the working group that had been involved in putting the new funding modeltogether and had voted in favour of it when it was unanimously agreed by the Board and did not raise anything regarding putting a cap in place.

DC stated thatNPAS report on a monthly basis to each forcewhat the usage is and therefore would be able to see any trends developing as to whether or not NPAS receive a significant reduction in calls.

RL requested that the counter terrorism (CT) actioned calls to service and support costs are shown separately within the monthly figures provided to forces to provide more transparency and clarity. DC advised there would be occasions where NPAS would deploy but not know whether it was for a CT purpose due to the covert issue. MBW stated he would raise the issue around what can be delivered from a CT perspective at the CT Oversight Group which is chaired by David Jamieson, Police and Crime Commissioner for West Midlands.

PCC Board members all contributed and carefully considered whether next year’s contributions to PCC/forces would include a further 12month period of dampening, reducing the cost to a small number of outlier forces. This was not supported by Members who voted unanimously for the full cost of air support utilised by each force to be charged on the ‘Actioned Calls to Service’ model.

Resolved:

  • The 2017/18 budget was approved
  • The recommendation to hold a £1m reserve for fuel price and exchange rate fluctuations was approved
  • Appendix C was unanimously agreed as the proposed contributions. This method is based on using the actioned calls to service model with no further transitional adjustments

Action – A letter to be sent to all Police and Crime Commissioners and Chief Constables from MBW and DC advising each force of their 2017/18 contributions.

  1. Any Other Business

No AOB was raised

Date and time of next meeting –9 March2017 - 1.00pm – 4.00pm

Carr Gate, Bradford Road, Wakefield, WF2 0QD

Page 1 of 4