Hate crime statistics for MLAs

The request was successful.

Dear Sir or Madam,

Could you please provide me with the number of currently elected MLAs in Northern Ireland that have been reported as committing any kind of hate crime for the past five years, and the number of reports of any kind of hate crime against currently elected MLAs for the past five years?

Please note that I am not requesting the identities or personal information of any individuals. Replies which involve attachments in proprietary file formats (such as PDFs, Word Documents and others) are not acceptable. A reply which is not in plain text format will be deemed to be a refusal to answer.

Yours faithfully,

Max Power

Police Service of Northern Ireland

1 Attachment

April 20, 2009

Dear Mr. Power,

FREEDOM of INFORMATION ACT 2000

I write in connection with your request for information dated April 17, 2009 which was received by the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) on April 17, 2009. I note you seek access to the following information:

Questions in relation to currently elected MLAs and hate crime.

This request will be dealt with under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act 2000. A response should be sent to you within 20 working days. The Freedom of Information team will advise you in writing if there are any delays in responding to your request and will keep you advised of progress.

In the event where the cost of complying with the request would exceed the "appropriate level", which is fixed at £450, as stated in the Freedom of Information Regulations 2004, it is the policy of the PSNI to close the request. You will however be notified of this decision and given an opportunity to refine and resubmit the request.

If your request requires either full or partial transference to another public authority in order to answer your query, again, you will be notified.
If you have any queries regarding your request please write or contact the Freedom of Information Team on 028 9070 0164. Please remember to quote the reference number listed above in any future communications with the Freedom of Information Team.

If you are dissatisfied in any way with the handling of your request, you have the right to request a review.You should do this as soon as possible, or in any case within two months of the date of issue of this letter. In the event that you require a review to be undertaken, you can do so by writing to the Head of Freedom of Information, PSNI Headquarters, 65 Knock Road, Belfast, BT5 6LE or by emailing [email address].

If following an internal review, carried out by an independent decision maker, you were to remain dissatisfied in any way with the handling of the request you may make a complaint, under Section 50 of the Freedom of Information Act, to the Information Commissioner's Office and ask that they investigate whether the PSNI has complied with the terms of the Freedom of Information Act. You can write to the Information Commissioner at Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF. In most circumstances the Information Commissioner will not investigate a complaint unless an internal review procedure has been carried out, however the Commissioner has the option to investigate the matter at his discretion.

Yours sincerely,

Mr Gordon Reid
A/Head of Freedom of Information

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Police Service of Northern Ireland

1 Attachment

April 30, 2009

Dear Mr. Power,

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000

I write in connection with your request for information dated April 17,
2009 which was received by the Police Service of Northern Ireland on
April 17, 2009. I note you seek access to the following information:

"Could you please provide me with the number of currently elected MLAs
in Northern Ireland that have been reported as committing any kind of
hate crime for the past five years, and the number of reports of any
kind of hate crime against currently elected MLAs for the past five
years?"

To enable the Police Service of Northern Ireland to meet your request
could you please provide further clarification on the following .

Can you clarify what is meant by 'report' please?
Is it reports from the public or reported for prosecution and does it
include charged? Please note that if you mean 'reports from the
public', the resulting search for information would involve a manual
trawl through vast amounts of information and would be very likely to
exceed cost limits applicable to requests under the Act.

You should be aware that the 20 day legislative time limit dictated by
the Freedom of Information Act 2000 has been stopped until we receive
clarification of your request.

Please send clarification of your request by writing to Freedom of
Information Team, PSNI Headquarters, 65 Knock Road Belfast BT5 6LE or by
email to [email address]. Alternatively, if you wish to discuss
your request or have any additional queries you can contact me on 028
9070 0164.

Yours sincerely,

Mr Gordon Reid
A/Head of Freedom of Information

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Dear Sir or Madam,

I apologise for the lack of clarity in my original request.

In reply to your email:

"
Can you clarify what is meant by 'report' please?
Is it reports from the public or reported for prosecution and does it
include charged? Please note that if you mean 'reports from the
public', the resulting search for information would involve a manual
trawl through vast amounts of information and would be very likely to
exceed cost limits applicable to requests under the Act."

By report I mean those reported for prosecution and those charged, as you have written above.

If you have any further need for clarification please do not hesitate to contact me.

Yours sincerely,

Max Power

Police Service of Northern Ireland

1 Attachment

Subject: F-2009-01327

May 19, 2009

Dear Mr. Power,

FREEDOM of INFORMATION ACT 2000

I write in connection with your request for information dated April 17,
2009 which was received by the Police Service of Northern Ireland,
(PSNI) on April 17, 2009. I note you seek access to the following
information:

The number of currently elected MLAs in Northern Ireland that have been
reported as committing any kind of hate crime for the past five years

Question
"Could you please provide me with the number of currently elected MLAs
in Northern Ireland that have been reported as committing any kind of
hate crime for the past five years, and the number of reports of any
kind of hate crime against currently elected MLAs for the past five
years?"

Answer
Searches were conducted however these searches failed to locate any
records or documents relevant to your request based on the information
you have provided. Accordingly, I have determined that the Police
Service of Northern Ireland does not hold the information to which you
seek access.

In order to answer your questions it would be necessary for the PSNI to
carry out checks on each individual MLA. To do this we would need the
name, home address and Date of Birth of each MLA as in the past we have
found that there are people on our crime recording systems who have the
same name and DOB. Also in relation to victims, we record a new victim
per report and depending on how they are recorded will determine if the
victim details will be matched. I have attempted to retrieve the
required names, address and DOBs from our Districts so that the checks
could be carried out centrally. Some name and address information has
been provided, but the list is incomplete and there is no DOB
information available, therefore it is not possible to carry out the
necessary checks.

If you are dissatisfied in any way with the handling of your request,
you have the right to request a review.You should do this as soon as
possible, or in any case within two months of the date of issue of this
letter.In the event that you require a review to be undertaken, you can
do so by writing to the Head of Freedom of Information, PSNI
Headquarters, 65 Knock Road, Belfast, BT5 6LE or by emailing
[email address].

If following an internal review, carried out by an independent decision
maker, you were to remain dissatisfied in any way with the handling of
the request you may make a complaint,under Section 50 of the Freedom of
Information Act, to the Information Commissioner's Office and ask that
they investigate whether the PSNI has complied with the terms of the
Freedom of Information Act. You can write to the Information
Commissioner at Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water
Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF. In most circumstances the Information
Commissioner will not investigate a complaint unless an internal review
procedure has been carried out, however the Commissioner has the option
to investigate the matter at his discretion.

Please be advised that PSNI replies under Freedom of Information may be
released into the public domain via our website @
<outbind://35/www.psni.police.uk> www.psni.police.uk

Personal details in respect of your request have, where applicable, been
removed to protect confidentiality.

Yours sincerely

Mr Gordon Reid

A/Head of Freedom of Information

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Dear Sir or Madam,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of Police Service of Northern Ireland's handling of my FOI request 'Hate crime statistics for MLAs'.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address:
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/ha...

Yours sincerely,

Max Power

Police Service of Northern Ireland

1 Attachment

Subject: F-2009-01327

May 19, 2009

Dear Mr. Power,

FREEDOM of INFORMATION ACT 2000

I acknowledge receipt of your correspondence dated requesting that
Police Service of Northern Ireland review its response to your request
for information concerning:

Questions in relation to currently elected MLAs and hate crime.

An internal review will be conducted in accordance with Police Service
of Northern Ireland's review procedure. It is envisaged that the review
process will take no longer than two months from date of receipt of your
letter, however we will endeavour to respond earlier.

In accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000 an independent
decision maker will carry out a review of this case and advise you in
writing of the outcome.

If you wish to discuss this matter prior to receiving a response please
contact me on 028 9070 0164. Please remember to quote the reference
number above in any future communications.

If following an internal review you were to remain dissatisfied in any
way with the handling of the request you may make a complaint to the
Information Commissioner's Office and ask that they investigate whether
the PSNI has complied with the terms of the Freedom of Information Act.
You can write to the Information Commissioner at Information
Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire,
SK9 5AF. The Information Commissioner will not investigate a complaint
unless an internal review procedure has been carried out.

Yours sincerely

Mr Gordon Reid
A/Head of Freedom of Information

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Police Service of Northern Ireland

1 Attachment

June 3, 2009

Dear Mr. Power,

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000

I write in connection with your request for information dated May 29,
2009 which was received by the The Police Service of Northern Ireland
on May 29, 2009. I note you seek access to the following information:

Disciplinary proceedings for any dignity at work or hate crime issue

To enable the Police Service of Northern Ireland to meet your request
could you please provide further clarification on the following;

Can it be assumed that disciplinary proceedings relate to those cases
which result in the issue of an informal or formal sanction?

Can it also be assumed that informal and formal procedures relate to the
imposition of informal and formal sanctions?

Can it be assumed that the incidents which resulted in disciplinary
action refer to police on police and police on police staff?

There may be cases where informal sanctions are administered at local
management level without recourse to Professional Standards Department.
To obtain this information will entail a trawl of all
DCU's/Departments/Branches. This would be very likely to place this
request over cost. At this stage would you be satisfied to receive
details as recorded by Professional Standards Department?

The incidents will be recorded by date of allegation and not by date of
disciplinary sanction. Would you be satisfied to receive the
information in respect of allegations reported within the last three
financial years i.e. 2006/2007, 2007/2008 and 2008/2009.

You should be aware that the 20 day legislative time limit dictated by
the Freedom of Information Act 2000 has been stopped until we receive
clarification of your request.

Please send clarification of your request by writing to Freedom of
Information Team, PSNI Headquarters, 65 Knock Road Belfast BT5 6LE or by
email to [email address]. Alternatively, if you wish to discuss
your request or have any additional queries you can contact me on 028
9070 0164.

Yours sincerely,

Mr Gordon Reid
A/Head of Freedom of Information

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Dear Sir or Madam,

Thank you for your prompt reply. To answer your questions:

Can it be assumed that disciplinary proceedings relate to those cases
which result in the issue of an informal or formal sanction?

Yes

Can it also be assumed that informal and formal procedures relate to the
imposition of informal and formal sanctions?

Yes

Can it be assumed that the incidents which resulted in disciplinary
action refer to police on police and police on police staff?

Yes

At this stage would you be satisfied to receive
details as recorded by Professional Standards Department?

Yes

Would you be satisfied to receive the
information in respect of allegations reported within the last three
financial years i.e. 2006/2007, 2007/2008 and 2008/2009.

Yes

My apologies for not being precise enough in my original request. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to clarify.

Yours sincerely,

Max Power

Police Service of Northern Ireland

1 Attachment

Subject: F-2009-01797

June 30, 2009

Dear Mr Power

FREEDOM of INFORMATION ACT 2000

I write in connection with your request for information which was
received by the Police Service of Northern Ireland on June 1, 2009
concerning;

Disciplinary proceedings initiated against officers for any dignity at
work or hate crime issue.

I can confirm that the Police Service of Northern Ireland has now
completed its search for the information you seek and a decision has
been taken to release the located information to you in full.

Question

Could you please provide me with the total number of PSNI officers for
the past three years (clarified as financial years) who have had
disciplinary proceedings (clarified as relating to those cases which
resulted in the issue of an informal or formal sanction) initiated
against them for any dignity at work or hate crime issue, which should
for the purpose of this request at least include any proceedings
concerning the following:

Harassment, bullying, discrimination, homophobia, unwanted unreasonable
or offensive conduct, unwanted physical contact (from touching to
assault), verbal or physical threats or abuse, sectarian, political,
racist or derogatory remarks (clarified as being police on police or
police on police staff).

If it is feasible could you provide a breakdown for each year separating
informal procedure from formal procedure (clarified as relating to the
imposition of informal and formal sanctions)?

You have indicated by e mail on 5th June 2009 that you will be content
to receive details as recorded by the Professional Standards Department
of the PSNI

Answer

During the 2006/2007 financial year, 12 officers (10 separate incidents)
received disciplinary sanctions associated with allegations which
include one or more of the following categories:

Bullying, harassment (including sexual harassment), inappropriate
language, inappropriate behaviour and racist and sectarian comments.

All officers received an informal sanction i.e. 5 x written warning, 6 x
advice and guidance and 1 x management discussion. In an 11th incident
one officer was convicted at a criminal court but left the PSNI prior to
completion of the disciplinary process.

In one of the 10 incidents a civilian staff member was also disciplined
and received a formal sanction of dismissal.

In the 2007/2008 financial year, 8 officers (6 separate incidents)
received disciplinary sanctions associated with allegations which
include one or more of the following categories:

Bullying, inappropriate language and behaviour and foul and abusive
language.

One officer appeared before a Misconduct Panel and received a formal
sanction of a fine. The remaining 7 officers all received informal
sanctions (3 x written warning and 4 x advice and guidance).

One officer in the 2008/2009 financial year faced an allegation of
making a homophobic comment. This officer received an informal sanction
of a written warning.

The figures relate to the year on which behaviour occurred and not to
the imposition of the sanction. The year of occurrence and the year of
issue of the sanction may not necessarily fall within the same period.

The figures supplied have been compiled by the PSNI's Professional
Standards Department which has responsibility for internal discipline
relating to police officers. All the details requested are not recorded
centrally and were obtained from the interrogation of several databases
across a number of different categories and the manual examination of a
number of files. Information extracted in this manner may not be as
accurate as that extracted from a single central database.

It should be noted that each case of alleged misconduct is examined on
an individual basis to determine the level and nature of misconduct of
the officer and the extent to which the PSNI's Code of Ethics has been
breached. The seriousness of the offence, the circumstances surrounding
its commission and its potential impact will dictate the level of action
to be pursued and the misconduct sanction ultimately imposed.

Whilst the PSNI takes extremely seriously any allegation of wrongdoing
and will not hesitate to take appropriate action where breaches of
misconduct occur, the number of cases must be put into context of the
overall size of the PSNI of just over 8500 officers as of the date of
your request.

United Kingdom Police Services do not use generic systems to capture
information. For this reason PSNI's response to your questions should
not be used for comparison purposes with any other Police Service.

If you have any queries regarding your request or the decision please do
not hesitate to contact the Freedom of Information Team on 028 9070
0164. When contacting the Freedom of Information Team, please quote the
reference number listed at the beginning of this email.

If you are dissatisfied in any way with the handling of your request,
you have the right to request a review. You should do this as soon as
possible, or in any case within two months of the date of issue of this
letter. In the event that you require a review to be undertaken, you can
do so by writing to the Head of Freedom of Information, PSNI
Headquarters, 65 Knock Road, Belfast, and BT5 6LE or by emailing
<mailto:[email address]> [email address].

If following an internal review, carried out by an independent decision
maker, you were to remain dissatisfied in any way with the handling of
the request you may make a complaint, under Section 50 of the Freedom of
Information Act, to the Information Commissioner's Office and ask that
they investigate whether the PSNI has complied with the terms of the
Freedom of Information Act. You can write to the Information
Commissioner at Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water
Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF. In most circumstances the Information
Commissioner will not investigate a complaint unless an internal review
procedure has been carried out, however the Commissioner has the option
to investigate the matter at his discretion.

Please be advised that PSNI replies under Freedom of Information may be
released into the public domain via our website @
http://www.psni.police.uk/

Personal details in respect of your request have, where applicable, been
removed to protect confidentiality.

Yours sincerely,

WJ Robinson

Access to Information Unit

Professional Standards Department

PSNI

Lisnasharragh

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Police Service of Northern Ireland

1 Attachment

July 22nd 2009

Dear Mr Power

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000

I write in connection with your request for information dated 5/3/09 and
further correspondence received 19/5/09 for a review of the initial
decisions regarding the following freedom of information requests: -

Reference No:

1) F-2009-01327

Could you please provide me with the number of currently elected

MLAs in Northern Ireland that have been reported as committing any

kind of hate crime for the past five years, and the number of

reports of any kind of hate crime against currently elected MLAs

for the past five years?

Please note that I am not requesting the identities or personal

information of any individuals. Replies which involve attachments

in proprietary file formats (such as PDFs, Word Documents and

others) are not acceptable. A reply, which is not in plain text

format will be deemed to be a refusal to answer.

At the outset I must reiterate that any request made under the Freedom
of Information Act 2000 (FOIA) will be treated as applicant blind.
Although the public authority will have a name and address for
correspondence this is not an overriding factor in arriving at any
decision to release information.

In every case, information will be released under FOIA into the public
domain and therefore the PSNI must be satisfied and content with a
number of issues relating to any harm that may be caused by disclosure
and the public interest etc.

I can advise you that the PSNI has now completed its independent
internal review regarding the initial response to your request dated
19/5/09.

My review focused on Section 1 (1) and 3 (1)(a, b), (2) (b) of the
Freedom of Information Act 2000 in that any person making a request for
information to a public authority is entitled: -

(a) To be informed in writing by the public authority whether it holds
information of the description specified in the request and

(b) If that is the case, to have that information communicated to him.

I have independently examined this request and hope the following
response will clarify our current position and assist in explaining the
original determination.

The PSNI like any other United Kingdom Police Service will process data
relating to convictions on an internal electronic crime recording
information system.

Once an individual has been reported or charged with an offence and this
leads to a successful prosecution, the details will be entered on the
system. If a person is the victim of a crime their personal data will
also be recorded on the crime recording information system and both will
be held in line with the PSNI retention policy.

Unfortunately there is no easy method to recover information that would
relate to particular groups or organisations that an individual may be
associated with.

The PSNI can provide information on a wide variety of offence and
offender types and these can include hundreds of actual records. If a
question is asked about specific individuals who may be contained within
offence groups / codes either as an offender or victim, the specific
records will then have to be individually identified and carefully
examined to recover any data.

As previously highlighted, to completely answer your question will
require the full name, date of birth and current address and previous
address if known on each individual member of the Northern Ireland
Legislative Assembly.

The PSNI will hold personal data relating to MLA's for a number of
reasons and this will only be consensual or when the law permits us to
do so without consent. Despite this, the dates of birth are not held in
a large number of instances and some MLA's who have never had any cause
to be involved with the police do not have any desire for the police to
hold any of their personal data.

Lists of current Northern Ireland MLA's are widely available but they
will only contain the name, constituency and the party to whom the
individual represents. DOB's and private address will not be included.

I have carried out further enquires within Police Districts and examined
the PSNI crime recording information system and determined the
information you are requesting is not fully held by the PSNI.
Consequently I am unable to provide you with a response in relation to
your question.

In conclusion, I am satisfied the PSNI Central Freedom of Information
Team properly processed your request for information.

Reasonable steps were taken to establish if the PSNI did hold the
information that you requested but unfortunately in this instance that
was not the case. The PSNI are not in a position to provide you with a
comprehensive answer, as we do not hold the data required to allow us to
do so.

Another public authority - namely the Northern Ireland Assembly,
Stormont, may hold this information. I have identified that assistance
should have been provided to you within our initial response by pointing
you to the relevant public authority that may assist. I would apologise
for this oversight.

They can be contacted at the following address: -.

The Freedom of Information Unit
Northern Ireland Assembly
Parliament Buildings,
Belfast
Northern Ireland
BT4 3XX

TN: +44 (0)28 9052 1147
FAX: +44 (0)28 9041 8340
E-mail: [email address] <mailto:[email address]>

If you still remain unhappy as to how your request has been handled you
may wish to apply directly to the Information Commissioner for a
decision. You can write to the Information Commissioner at Information
Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire
SK9 5AF.

Yours Sincerely,

Paul Cleland

Data Protection Officer

Police Service of Northern Ireland

Headquarters

Knock

Belfast

BT5 6LE

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