Collaborating on EBP

While Temporary Detective Constable Amy Rutland’s degree is not immediately relevant to the role she now performs, her time at university certainly gave her ample preparation for her dream job and what life would involve on joining Leicestershire Police. Having graduated with a degree in archaeology, T/Det Con Rutland’s studies established a solid grounding in research and volunteering as a special constable while at university ensured she was ready to become an officer full time on leaving education. That was almost five years ago, but practical research continues to play a major part in her life having included a foundation degree at De Montfort University during initial training. It was again through voluntary work that she achieved her next opportunity. While working voluntarily in her spare time for a charity and having a keen interest in slavery from a civil liberty perspective, she was eager to combine the two and carry out some research into modern slavery in Leicester. At the same time, the East Midlands Police Academic Collaboration (EMPAC) was establishing a fellowship scheme to offer police officers the opportunity to accredit research they could perform with the support of one of the five universities in the region. T/Det Con Rutland’s project became a guinea pig for the EMPAC fellowship scheme, she was provided with links to academics at Loughborough University and the work to identify how police forces and their partners can improve tackling modern slavery took off. “I was lucky the fellowship scheme came about at that time because I was having trouble trying to do it,” she says. “There was little support in place for frontline, operational officers to conduct research – the only existing way to do it was by already having a masters or PhD.” At the time, the fellowship scheme was in its infancy – there are now 28 East Midlands region officers conducting accredited research projects – but through Leicestershire Police’s contacts with Loughborough University, connections were made to academics who were also involved in establishing the fellowship scheme – Karen Lumsden, who leads the victims and public protection network, and Matej Blazek, who specialises in human trafficking. Through monthly meetings, T/Det Con Rutland’s research project was established. Since then she has been formally enrolled onto the EMPAC scheme. While conducting interviews with participants for the research, it was apparent that there was little knowledge of modern slavery among many frontline agencies, however, there has been a considerable amount of interest shown in developing their awareness. Leicestershire Police ran a modern slavery training and partnership day at the university last week, including a wide range of speakers and delegates, including the Salvation Army, the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority, frontline officers and their partner agencies. T/Det Con Rutland’s study began by attempting to collect as much data as possible about modern slavery. While conducting voluntary work at the time, she knew agencies were encountering potential victims but there were a number of barriers to prevent effective information sharing with the police. When she contacted other agencies, they did not think they were even coming across any victims, or did not know how to identify one. So instead of gathering information about who the victims were and why they are trafficked, the research refocused on the gaps in service provision, a lack of communication between agencies and a lack of sources of support and training. T/Det Con Rutland says the problems have arisen not because relationships do not exist between agencies but more as a result of the challenging nature of the issue. “A lot of the victims are very marginalised and a lot of them don’t recognise that they are victims themselves,” T/Det Con Rutland explains. “It’s very difficult for them to talk openly about the situation, especially if they are in contact with a service for ten minutes every few weeks. There can also be distrust of