By Carmelo Garcia – Local Democracy Reporter
Civic chiefs tasked with scrutinising Gloucestershire’s police and crime commissioner were “kept in the dark” for nine months over the suspension of the deputy chief constable.
Gloucestershire Constabulary’s former deputy chief constable Shaun West was suspended in January this year pending an investigation relating to a number of serious allegations including assault and misconduct in public office.
At the time the police did not reveal his identity.
All that was reported was that a senior police officer for Gloucestershire had been suspended and was under investigation on suspicion of common assault.
Mr West later retired in June 2024 but remains subject to an Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) investigation.
He was suspended by Chief Constable Rod Hansen in January 2024 after the IOPC launched an investigation.
However, his identity was only revealed last month by Gloucestershire Constabulary after the suspension of Mr Hansen who is under investigation on the handling of an allegation of computer misuse and a potential data breach by another member of staff.
That particular investigation will ascertain whether relevant policies and procedures were subsequently followed.
Councillors asked Conservative police and crime commissioner Chris Nelson at the police and crime panel on November 1 about why they had not been informed about the strategic risk of the constabulary being without a deputy chief constable.
Cllr Philip Burford (I, Hartpury and Redmarley) said: “Clearly there was a substantial problem that you had to suspend the chief constable and that we didn’t have a deputy chief in post at the time.
“To the best of my recollection, having been through minutes and everything else with the chairman, I don’t believe you actually informed the panel that we were without a deputy chief constable at any point.
“Would you like to comment on why you didn’t do that, please?”
Mr Nelson said he believed they did inform the panel but explained that the suspension of anyone less than the Chief Constable is down to the chief. “When they put out a press release, Ithink they used the phrase senior officer in the force,” he said.
That’s why perhaps the public might not have been aware of things in the way the panel would be.”
Cllr Burford expressed the difficulty in holding the police and crime commissioner to account without important information.
“The problem that I have is that from a strategic leadership point of view, if we are to hold you to account to ensure you are providing adequate policing to the county, it seems to me at least that it would have been very nice for the panel to be aware that for a substantial part of this year we were without a deputy chief constable,” Cllr Burford said.
“I don’t believe we would be doing our job correctly if we weren’t able to come to you and say that we wanted to know what your plans were in the event that something happened that we hadn’t got a chief constable.
“It’s particularly relevant that while we’ve got three assistant chief constables, none of them are actually qualified to step up to become chief.
“We are in a position of a senior leadership team of five in the Constabulary, by losing one of them we were not in a position to be able to backfill immediately.
“From a scrutiny point of view, I’d like to know your thought process about that risk and why that risk wasn’t addressed or indeed reported to us.”
Chairman Steve Robinson (L, Nailsworth) said it might be something Mr Nelson could put on a list as something to inform the panel of in future, should it happen again.
Cllr Burford said the panel did not want it to happen again but wanted to be sure that if it does they are informed. Chief executive Ruth Greenwood accepted his point and said it was a learning point for the police and crime commissioner’s office.
She said being without a deputy chief was an issue they raised in their governance and holding to account meetings.
Ms Greenwood explained the recruitment for a deputy chief constable process was paused after receiving only one application and the constabulary was going to wait to run it again to allow a bigger pool of people to apply.
“I do take your point and we will do our best to ensure that it is at least reported in the chief executive’s report from now on.”
Gloucester News Centre – http://gloucesternewscentre.co.uk
