Decisions

Mandem Meetup is a grassroots charity promoting, correcting and improving the conversation around men’s mental health and wellbeing. It provides an open, inclusive community for all those who identify as a man, integrating a range of social, holistic and more ‘traditional’ forms of clinical support, ranging from psycho-social interventions and recreational activities to practical advice and guidance, as well as talking therapy and more. To date, 1700+ men have received interventions from Mandem Meetup.

Mandem Meetup are part of the umbrella network of organisations within the Greater Manchester Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE) and Trauma Responsive programme, which the VRU has co-funded extensively since both its- and the TR programme’s- inception in 2019. Within the GMCA, the GM Reform Board & VRU work with the GM NHS Integrated Care Board to promote a shared understanding of the concept of trauma-responsive care, recognising the prevalence of trauma in people’s lives and acknowledging potential effects that this can have on individuals, families, networks & communities. On 9th January 2024, 550 colleagues from across the GM system attended a VRU-sponsored event to hear about work that has been happening across Greater Manchester to achieve our goal of being an ACE and trauma responsive city-region, of which Mandem Meetup attended and participated at in partnership with We Are Survivors. This activity is central to the Greater Than Violence strategy, within which becoming a trauma responsive city region is one of 5 core principles.



Given their proximity to the VRU’s activity via Trauma Responsive GM and the terms of reference of all VRU delivery groups, Mandem Meetup have been awarded £10,000 in grant funding from the GM VRU to support the delivery of Mandem Meetup Trauma Responsive activity in 2024, and this Decision Notice seeks authorisation to proceed with this funding award.

In return for the funding, the VRU will require Mandem Meetup to report on outcomes per schedule 1 of the grant funding agreement.

A funding amount of £10,000 from the Violence Reduction Unit is to be awarded to Mandem Meetup in Q2 2024 via a grant funding agreement.

The withdrawal of Greater Manchester from the Home Office DRIVE perpetrator programme alongside much reduced funding secured from the most recent round of Home Office Perpetrator Funding has meant that Greater Manchester has faced a significant drop in potential income for perpetrator work.

These two factors have created an income gap for TLC in the 2023/24 financial year. TLC have taken the following action to mitigate the impact of this loss of income:

• Negotiating with Local Authorities to secure contributions.
• Restructuring / halting recruitment to vacant posts
• Applying for Trust and Grant funding
• Investigating the feasibility of establishing commercial income streams in other parts of the charity.


Despite all these efforts TLC remain just over £150,000 short of filling this income gap and this will impact on their ability to retain key staff and upon their preparedness to be a key agent of delivery of planned perpetrator provision associated with the national GM pilot of Domestic Abuse Protection Orders (DAPOs).

TLC are central to perpetrator provision within GM and are the only RESPECT accredited charity provider of perpetrator programmes in the City region.

• This offer of support will come with a clear proviso that this is a one-off bridging grant in recognition of the particularly difficult and unique circumstances.
• This offer is being made to strategically underpin perpetrator provision in GM and to support the successful delivery of the DAPO pilot.
• The grant will significantly reduce the risk of GM not having the infrastructure to be able to deliver on planned Home Office perpetrator programmes.
• This funding is in line with the GM Voluntary Sector Accord – to provide a bridging gap to ensure the resilience of the model.
• This grant funding should result in a return on some of the investment once the DAPO commences.

The Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime approves funding to support vital perpetrator intervention infrastructure in Greater Manchester by granting £150,000 to the Greater Manchester based charity Talk Listening Change (TLC).

This is a one-off bridging grant to ensure that there is appropriate voluntary sector infrastructure and resilience in place in to deliver Domestic Abuse Perpetrator work in Greater Manchester .

The Deputy Mayor for Police, Crime, Criminal Justice and Fire has a responsibility to provide services for victims of crime, including victims of rape and sexual assault.

In Greater Manchester, these support services are provided at the Sexual Assault Referral Centre, based at the St Mary’s Centre, NHS Manchester University Foundation Trust. The provision is an all-age service which provides support for victims of rape or sexual assault in terms of a forensic examination and crisis support, support for people going through the criminal justice process and therapeutic/counselling support. The service can be accessed by a referral from an agency, including but not exclusive to Greater Manchester Police, or victims can also choose to self-refer. The service currently supports anybody who lives in Greater Manchester in addition to providing support for individuals who were assaulted in Greater Manchester, but do not reside in the area.

Demand
There were nearly 12,000 sexual offences reported to GMP in 2023, of which 37% were rape. 58% of these offences were committed against adults whilst over 5000 sexual offences were committed against children. This included 1400 offences which were rape against a child. In 2023, SARC carried out 854 forensic medical examinations and 214 counselling cases were closed.

Progress towards agreeing a full Service specification for SARC and Implementing a 3-year contract

Over the course of 2022/23 the GM PCC have been working with SARC to both document the service provision with the associated costings, and also outline the service needs to improve operational delivery to meet demand. This is with a view to move to an agreed formal contracted position which will run until March 31st 2026. The first step in this process has been the GMCA, NHS Integrated Care and the Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust agreeing a price for the service.

We have been documenting SARCs services based on the segregation of the service into the below 4 pillars:

1. Forensic medical examinations for adults
2. Forensic medical examinations for children / young persons
3. ISVA provision
4. Therapeutic counselling support

We have moved to a position where we have agreed the service specification and fixed price for pillars 1,2 and 3 and are in the process of finalising a formal contract with the Trust for this provision which will run until March 31st 2026.

Pillar 4 The Therapeutic counselling support has inherent complications as demand has stripped capacity at SARC. We will seek procurement advice on meeting commercial compliance regulations with any agreed way forward for this work.

To allocate £3,003,594 to Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust for the provision of support services by the St Marys Centre to victims of rape and serious sexual offences to cover the period of 1st April 2023 - March 31st, 2024.This encompasses the full and complete costs for the service including quarterly contract payments, baseline of ISVA provision, therapeutic support, and also costs of the Forensic Medical Examinations. The fixed annual price has been pre agreed by the GMCA, NHS Integrated Care and the Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust.

The SARC service is jointly funded by Greater Manchester NHS Integrated Care on a 50/50 basis and as such, the amount indicated above is the total SARC budget. The GMCA/PCC contribution is half of this. (£1,501,797.40).

The Home Office require all Safer Street Fund bids and financials matters to be processed through the Deputy Mayors office.

The three Greater Manchester Home Office Safer Streets Fund Round 5 have a total combined budget of £847,969

2023/24 = £463,181
2024/25 = £384,788

A grant agreement is in place between the GMCA and the Home Office for the 2023/24 funding and we are awaiting the signed 2024/25 grant agreement to be provided.

The GMCA led programme has three primary interventions that will target the following crimes:

- Neighbourhood crimes of Robbery, Theft from a Person, Vehicle Crime,
- Anti-social Behaviour including drunk and disorderly behaviour, public transport vandalism, drug and substance misuse, intimidating behaviour
- Violence Against Women and Girls including sexual assault, indecent assault, street harassment, drink spiking

The proposed interventions are
- Delivery of Op Safer Streets by Greater Manchester Police in Manchester City Centre.
- TfGM Drone to support operations to reduce ASB and VAWG incidents on the nighttime transport network.
- TfGM and Foundation 92 led hub to be deployed across the Transport network to address incidents of ASB.

The deployment of a drone will act as both as a deterrent to ASB but also provide safety and monitoring enhancing capabilities when required by TfGM control room operators. Drones offer a versatile and efficient means of monitoring, inspecting and responding to various safety issues on the transport network.

Oversight of the programme is provided by Oliver Collins in the Police, Crime, Criminal Justice and Fire Team at the GMCA.

The Deputy Mayor receives the Home Office Safer Streets Fund for the programme being led and delivered by the GMCA across 2023/24 and 2024/25 financial years.

The total budget for this programme is £175,000
2023/24 = £175,000
2024/25 = £0

Transport for Greater Manchester are to be provided with £25,000 of this funding for the procurement of a drone and associated training to TfGM to deploy the drone.

The reasons for the decision are:

From working with St Marys SARC, our provider of therapeutic support services of rape and other sexual offences for children and young people, a number of agreed challenges have been identified in this sector that require fully scoping in order to identify ways forward. This includes a lack of capacity to regularly monitor waiting lists, to review suitability, assess risk, and refer victims to more appropriate services where necessary. There is also a gap in terms of GM wide local protocols between SARC and Children’s Services/CAMHS.

There is recognition that there is significant complexity and high levels of need of the children and families that utilise the St Marys SARC service, with many unknowns about the collective profile of children and parents and the appropriateness of current pathways. GMCA Police and Crime Team have engaged with external consultants and particularly the NHS Integrated Care to scope out an independent review of SARC CYP case management.

This proposed review will deliver the following outcomes:
• Recognition of the importance and responsibilities of the range of partner agencies (health, education and social care) towards these children and their families;
• A clear articulation of the extent of the need of children (and parents) on the waiting list including how they profile in the range of children’s and adult services.
• A clear plan to safely reduce the child waiting list for CYP SARC counselling services;
• Options appraisal for the prompt delivery of services to children on the waiting list and the capacity within SARC to deliver this;
• Adequate escalation process for all agencies

This joint independent review will be conducted with a collaborative “critical friend” approach that draws on the expertise of the service to co-create a reflective learning process. This will include:
• Review of CAHMS eligibility in each area
• Identification of potential barriers from triage to onward referral
• Review of multi-agency safeguarding responsibilities
• Deep dive case review
• Review current case management systems and mechanisms to analyse patient demographics and trend data
• Consideration of the needs of parents including addressing their possible traumatisation and potential re-traumatisation in the context of their own history;
• Consideration of the role of SARC and other services in helping to educate parents on how to keep their children safe from further harm;

The review will be undertaken by Dr Alex Chard, Director YCTCS Ltd. He is a systemic organisational consultant, independent academic and professional author. He has a Professional Doctorate in Systemic Practice and is a member of the Society of Authors and the Institute of Directors. is recognised as a national expert in this field and has extensive experience including undertaking reviews into 2 London boroughs and reporting to a Home Office Minister.

£60k be committed from NHSE GM Health & Justice Budget to fund an Independent review of case management of SARC Children Young Persons therapeutic support for rape and other sexual offences. This is to be conducted by Dr Alex Chard, Director YCTCS Ltd.

The Home Office require all Safer Street Fund bids and financial matters to be processed through the Deputy Mayor’s office.

The three Greater Manchester Home Office Safer Streets Fund Round 5 have a total combined budget of £847,969.

2023/24 = £463,181
2024/25 = £384,788

A grant agreement is in place between the GMCA and the Home Office for the 2023/24 funding and we are awaiting the signed 2024/25 grant agreement to be provided.

The GMCA led programme has three primary interventions that will target the following crimes:

- Neighbourhood crimes of Robbery, Theft from a Person, Vehicle Crime,
- Anti-social Behaviour including drunk and disorderly behaviour, public transport vandalism, drug and substance misuse, intimidating behaviour,
- Violence Against Women and Girls including sexual assault, indecent assault, street harassment, drink spiking.

The proposed interventions are:
- Delivery of Op Safer Streets by Greater Manchester Police in Manchester City Centre.
- TfGM Drone to support operations to reduce ASB and VAWG incidents on the nighttime transport network.
- TfGM and Foundation 92 led hub to be deployed across the Transport network to address incidents of ASB.

Oversight of the programme is provided by the Police, Crime, Criminal Justice and Fire Team at the GMCA.

The Deputy Mayor receives the Home Office Safer Streets Fund for the programme being led and delivered by the GMCA across 2023/24 and 2024/25 financial years.

The total budget for this programme is £175,000
2023/24 = £175,000
2024/25 = £0

Greater Manchester Police are to be provided with £138,000 of this funding for the provision of Op Safer Streets.

Following competition Compass Minerals Storage & Archives Ltd t/a DeepStore emerged as the preferred supplier.

The Deputy Mayor approves the award of a 5 year contract for The Provision Of: Off Site Records Management and Associated Services to Compass Minerals Storage & Archives Ltd t/a DeepStore, with the option to extend for a further 2 years. The likely value of 7 years spend would be circa £700K.