Dear Police and Crime Commissioner Philip Wilkinson,

Over the course of the last few weeks, there has been much debate on the approach taken by the police and partners with regards to violent and group-based offending.

This culminated in the Government announcing a new national level rapid audit of grooming gangs and local inquiries to be established in five locations.

I welcome any initiative or process which scrutinises how the police service is protecting those most at risk to abuse and assists us in improving our service to them.

In Wiltshire Police, we’ve commissioned a priority review of all grooming and Child Sexual Exploitation investigations, outcomes and how we’ve managed the associated risks with these, initially for the last ten years. This will provide us with a comprehensive picture of offending in our county and help identify any improvements we can make to better support victims.

Whenever a child is abused or exploited, we will investigate without fear or favour – our investigations will always be victim-centric. We also know, based on our work with those who have a lived experience of child sexual abuse and exploitation, that these types of offences are underreported, and many victims remain silent for fear of not being believed.

We will not allow the voices of survivors to be marginalised, and we will ensure our policing response is robust and inclusive.

All police forces must strive towards improving our data quality regarding these types of crime to ensure we truly understand the full picture of the offending and that our response is effective.

As the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead for Children and Young People, I will continue to drive improvements to how policing serves children across all police forces.

The issue of violent offenders and knife crime has also been a national focus following the sentencing of Axel Rudakubana for the murders of Alice da Silva Aguiar, Bebe King and Elsie Dot Stancombe and 10 charges of attempted murder in Southport last July.

This tragic case has prompted much discussion around the management of those posing the greatest risks to the public.

To bolster the current activity happening in Wiltshire under our organisational priorities of tackling violence and safer public spaces, we’ve launched a dedicated operation targeting violent offenders.

This draws together a number of elements including;

On Tuesday evening, we held a joint Wiltshire Police and OPCC Facebook Live event which was focused on the financial challenges we face and our comprehensive savings plan.

We responded to a raft of questions and concerns from our communities and outlined how we intend to make efficiencies whilst remaining committed to continuing to improve the service they receive. I would like to thank everyone who contributed to the event and, if anyone missed this, you can watch it back on our Wiltshire Police Facebook page.

In relation to our funding, we were updated yesterday by the Home Secretary that our funding settlement has been reviewed. We are now working on understanding what this means for us and will update our communities as soon as we are able.

On the theme of ensuring our communities have access to the right information, I wanted to highlight a significant update from a partner agency this week.

Yesterday, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) lifted their ‘if you didn’t drop it, don’t pick it up’ advice for the Salisbury and Amesbury areas.

The advice had been in place since the Novichok incidents in 2018 and has been lifted following a formal public health risk assessment and review.

Our communities can find out more under the ‘Community litter initiatives’ section of the Wiltshire Council website.

We appreciate that this update, which follows the start of The Dawn Sturgess Inquiry last year, might bring back some difficult memories for those who were living and working in Salisbury and Amesbury in 2018. Our collective focus, therefore, remains on supporting our communities. 

Our communities can read the full statement I made following the conclusion of the open, public hearings of the Inquiry here.

Finally, I wanted to close by reflecting on Holocaust Memorial Day which took place on Monday and marked 80 years since the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.

During a visit to Poland, His Majesty King Charles III met with survivors, and I wanted to end this letter with a statement he made.

He said that the survivors of the Holocaust have "collectively taught us to cherish our freedom to challenge prejudice and never to be a bystander in the face of violence and hate.”

Kindest regards,

Catherine Roper

Chief Constable, Wiltshire Police