People 'at risk' of abuse in Bristol and Somerset due to police backlog

More than 300 requests to warn people if they are at risk of domestic abuse are currently in a police backlog.

Avon and Somerset Police said that all domestic violence disclosure scheme applications were being processed by one person, causing a bottleneck.

The Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) said the scheme, known as Clare's Law, lets people find out about the behaviour of a potential abuser.

The force say they are bringing in more staff to tackle the delays.

Under the disclosure scheme, people can request information from the police, or a third party can ask the police to tell someone at risk of abuse about their potential abuser's past.

The police may also disclose information to someone without an application if they believe they are at risk.

But an inspection by HM Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services published in March found there were delays in disclosing this information.

The inspectorate rated the force "adequate" for protecting vulnerable people and ordered them to reduce the backlog.

"If potential victims of domestic abuse or sexual offending aren't given information promptly, they can't make an informed decision about their safety and may unknowingly remain at risk," the inspectorate warned.

Asked for an update at the police and crime commissioner's performance and accountability board on 12 October, Assistant Chief Constable Jon Riley said that the number of pending applications remained at a similar level to when the inspection happened — at just over 300.

He said: "Clearly the volume's coming in, we've cleared some of the backlog, and the numbers have stayed pretty static.

"But to reassure, we risk assess and triage those applications to make sure the highest risk are dealt with in the first instance."

Mr Riley explained that processing the applications had been allocated as a task to one person, because it was a specialised task.

He added: "We have now been able to allocate three full-time members of staff to join that individual.

"So that recruitment is taking place now internally and they will be in place very quickly."

When the force was inspected, there was also a backlog of applications to disclose information about child sex offenders, with 43 cases waiting to be processed.

Mr Riley said the police had fully caught up with these.

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