SOCA urges increased flow of intelligence

The Serious and Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) has called for a greater flow of intelligence between law enforcement agencies as it publishes its first unclassified National Intelligence Requirement.

David Bolt, SOCA’s director of intelligence, said there is a lot of work to be done to improve the picture of serious organised crime – though it is becoming clearer each year – there are still many gaps in the full range of intelligence requirements.

Speaking to Police Professional following the publication of the first de-classified National Intelligence Requirement (NIR), Mr Bolt said that while mechanisms already exist for fast-time ‘hot’ intelligence, the NIR provides a process to build a more comprehensive picture of organised criminality, which is more difficult to obtain.

Mr Bolt said: “There is a lot of work to be done at a local level, especially about drugs activity, distribution methods, economics of the trade, pricing, who is involved, and issues to do with the movement of commodities or criminals.

“This work will allow us to have a better understanding of organised crime and lead to us being more effective in tackling it.

“The information exists, but is it getting to the place it needs to get to? That is partly a question of whether those in the law enforcement community recognise what is of interest to somebody else,” he added.

The NIR has grown since its inception under the National Criminal Intelligence Service some five years ago. Published annually, it informs the UK Threat Assessment (UKTA) and the UK Control Strategy – “the engine to tackle organised crime”.

In conjunction with the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO), SOCA has created an unclassified version of the NIR for the first time, for wider dissemination among the law enforcement community.

The classified version is restricted to those in intelligence functions yet it is officers on the ground who are most likely to collect information of interest.

The benefit of an unclassified version is that it can be used by anyone in law enforcement and even be stuck on police station walls if it will help.

The difference between the two versions of the NIR is the removal of priorities and level of knowledge already held. This is to reflect the competing priorities of some law enforcement agencies and to avoid handing any advantage to criminals.

The information required covers the continuum of organised crime, from drug manufacture in Afghanistan to trends in street dealing and criminals’ perceptions of law enforcement interventions.

Mr Bolt expects a much wider submission of intelligence as there is a growing consensus that while organised crime may happen internationally or regionally, the effects and harm are seen locally; such as trafficked women being imprisoned for prostitution or the peddling of low price heroin close to schools.

“There is a vested interest in joining up all of our capabilities and knowledge. You only need to look at the research behind causes of acquisitive crime and you can see problematic drug use and organised crime has a major impact on what happens locally.

“I am convinced that between us we know an awful lot. We are just not good at capturing and sharing it in a way we can exploit it. There is a lot of work to suck out from officers on the ground what they have learnt through years of experience and get that into the wider understanding,” said Mr Bolt.

“We want to reach out and let them know the sorts of information they are coming across in the course of their normal business that would have an interest to the community of law enforcement, beyond the normal tactical exploitation.

“We hope they recognise that what they collect as part of their normal business has an interest beyond the immediate aspect. Rather than putting a scale of one to three, anything and everything that is in the NIR is of interest. We would like to hear what you know,” said Mr Bolt.

ACPO lead on intelligence, A