Metro Mayor Andy Burnham has just announced that Greater Manchester Police chief inspector has resigned with immediate effect.
It follows after an enquiry into the performance of police services showed Greater Manchester Police did not record over one in five crimes between July 2019 and June 2020.
Chief constable Ian Hopkins said in a statement: “The force has a long-term strategic plan to address the issues raised by the HMIC and I believe this plan should be led by a Chief Constable who can oversee it from start to finish.
“Considering what is best for GMP and the communities we serve, and given my current ill health, I have decided to stand down from the post of Chief Constable with immediate effect.”
GMP said earlier this week that Mr Hopkins would be taking a break from his duties due to suffering with labyrinthitis since the end of October.
Last week, a damning report was published by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary, Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS) saying over 80,100 crimes were unrecorded in Manchester, making the rate of pursued crimes around 77 per cent which is down from 89 per cent in 2018.
Women, children and other vulnerable people were particularly effected with one in four violent crimes being unrecorded.
The report found that the force ‘generally responds well to calls from the public’ but failed to report the equivalent of 220 crimes per day between June 2019 and June 2020.
Mr Burnham said in a press conference earlier today: “This latest report, carried out in September, and based of force data between April and June this year revealed a unacceptable lack of progress.”
HM Inspector of Constabulary Zoe Billingham said: “This is extremely disappointing given that HMICFRS has been urging Greater Manchester Police to improve in this area since 2016..
“HMICFRS will be following up on this inspection within six months and I expect to see considerable and sustainable improvements.”
The force has now been placed in special measures where they will be required to develop an improvement plan and will be closely monitored.
Oldham Liberal Democrat Leader, Councillor Howard Sykes MBE, said: “Greater Manchester residents rely in their police service to keep them safe and protect them from crime and they rightly expect, and pay, for police officers to apprehend and charge offenders.
“This simply cannot go on.”
Conservative MP for Bolton West Chris Green has suggested that Andy Burnham should step down from his role as mayor after failing to address the problem.
After the report’s release, Mr Green wrote to Mr Burnham to raise his concerns over the report asking what action he was going to take before his office ended.
Mr Burnham and Bev Hughes, deputy mayor for policing and crime, are responsible for setting the budgets and governing GMP.
Photo from Unsplash.
